For When You Return
by Goudess
Summary: Just how strong is the will of the human spirit...of love...and to what epic lengths must Squall go to defeat an opponent that he cannot find? What will Rinoa learn of herself, having been torn by seperation and doubt? And as for the Guardian Forces..
1. Prolouge, Disclaimer, and Author's Notes

**Story Updates**  
  
Chapter Twenty  
  
Fearful for their friends' lives, Selphie, Quistis and Rinoa travel to Esthar in hopes to shed some light on the danger that is brewing there. Unfortunately, the danger had already -been- brewed, and everyone drank it already, and on an empty stomach to boot, so it's just a crazy drunken danger-mess when they get there.  
  
Insert a plot twist and a new face to the story thus far, and you have a recipe for adventure! Garnish with two dashes of nutmeg.  
  
I'm sorry. This is a serious story, I'm supposed to be serious. I haven't updated in a while. I'm shocked that I actually pushed something out, and it's... two in the morning right now, I'm not even going to edit anything, I'm just getting out the durn chapter because I actually -wrote- one. Hopefully this is a continuing trend -- thanks so much for reading, and waiting, if you did wait. I missed writing this story (college is kind of a dampener on creative projects, I'm realizing, and my concintration on original fiction kind of pushed this on the back-burner, although there's a love I have for this kind of stuff that can never be replaced), and hope that you missed reading it. Thanks for your comments and e-mails!  
  
In all seriousness though, this is the progressive ease into a very action-packed part of the story, something very climatic, actually, and that will lead into a great number of twists and revelations. I haven't reached the emotional peak of the piece yet, but if there's a physical one, this is it (or getting dangerously close). Read!   
  
I really am horrid at Roman Numerals. For serious.  
  
"For When You Return"  
  
Prolouge, Disclaimer, and Author's Notes (although not quite in that order):  
  
Author's Note  
  
How's my driving?  
  
This is indeed a first for me. Henceforth, I'm a little shaky about what I am doing and how I   
  
am going to go about doing it. Although clear on plot--which is loosely based on an original  
  
concept of mine--I am not entirely attuned to writing a full-length drama. Feedback would be   
  
most appreciated in terms of not what I did right (although nice things always feel good ^-^)   
  
but rather what I did wrong. My greatest fear, at this time, is drawing things out too long so  
  
that they seem dull. This may be most present in the first few chapters. Tips, suggestions,   
  
and even ideas for the future will be taken with the highest respect and graditude. This is,   
  
after all, something meant to be read and enjoyed. Don't be afraid to mail me... although I'm horrid at writing back sometimes. The love is still there, though, and I stress that greatly.  
  
Disclaimer  
  
Squaresoft Doesn't Like to Share  
  
I don't own them. You all know that. Credits and much adoration goes out to the writers of the songs, poems, and quotes that I have used in framing this story. Julia's Song (Turn Around), be it in full or in part, -is- mine... although with my poor poetic skills, I'm almost afraid to admit it. =P  
  
Prolouge  
  
And it starts:  
  
Every end is merely a path for a new beginning.   
  
Ultimecia has been defeated and the world slowly begins to wind down into a normal and peaceful   
  
state of being. The resistance that had taken down the evil sorceress had succeeded, and an   
  
adversary had been sedated to the great joy of many.  
  
Little did they know, this was only the nourishment for a spawning seed... an even greater   
  
threat that knew no spells, delivered no punch, and demanded no ransom. It was a threat that redifined fate as they knew it... a threat that lie within themselves.  
  
For When You Return is a multi-part saga that concintrates namely on the lives of the characters   
  
that are first introduced in Final Fantasy VIII, a game made for the Playstation console. It is,   
  
overall, a story of Destiny and True Love laced within a tale of science, mystery, fate, and the intense power of hope. 


	2. Book One: A Window to the Soul

"It's time to say  
Thank God for You  
I thank God for you  
In each and every single way.  
I know... I know...  
It's time to let you know  
Time to sit here and say...  
I know  
We are  
We are the lucky ones."  
--Bif Naked  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part One  
  
  
"Look! It's a beautiful day!" Rinoa stretched her long arms out and danced in a merry little   
circle atop of the sidewalk of Galbadia garden. It -was- a beautiful day, Squall noticed, but   
it wasn't the cloudless sky that first caught his eyes. Rather, he took note of the   
overpowering sight of the Garden itself, landed where it belonged and being repaired, set back   
into its foundation as if nothing had ever happened. Like ants on the latticework that framed   
the structure laborers moved about and wiped away scars of battle and wear.  
  
And then what? Squall thought. There isn't a point anymore. The Garden has served its purpose.   
It's all over - everything. SeeD. Even that... Wasn't its purpose to eliminate the sorceress...?  
  
"Squall!" Gone was Rinoa's playfulness. She was facing him squarely, feet planted after what   
must have been a firm stomp on the ground. Her arms were at her sides, and her eyebrow was   
raised in a manner that was, although not cold, not exactly pleasant either.  
  
"Huh?" With a blink and a stammer Squall lowered his head from where he had been looking to   
cast her a quick glance - looking to the eyes, only the eyes. They were, after all, the opening   
to a person's soul. However, his intent was not romantic, not at all. He simply wanted to read   
her mood in attempt to recuperate, as if her gaze would tell him exactly what he had missed. No   
such luck.  
  
"Didn't you hear me?" She frowned. "I asked you twice."  
  
Asked me what? Humph. What'd she expect, not telling him the specifics? Women. Squall, mind   
whirring, struggled over the possibilities in order to compose a response. His mind was   
actually quite quick, although he had no idea that Rinoa was watching him with full awareness   
of his plight - she could see the wheels turning, and that shift on anger turned into vague   
amusement, as she waited.  
  
"It is a pretty day." Squall finally said.  
  
"Mmm-hmm," Rinoa clasped her hands behind her back and rocked back and forth on her heels.   
Expectantly. Damn her.  
  
However, despite this, Squall felt a warm little twitter in his belly that he knew and   
recognized to be affection - this woman was Rinoa, his Rinoa, despite the flaws and irritations   
and...  
  
...Constant, never-ending mind games.  
  
"Umm...Well," Squall scratched at the side of his head and glanced over one shoulder, as if   
expecting someone to be there to blissfully rescue him. Nothing. Of course. Stifling a grimace,   
he turned to face Rinoa's soft--and yet piercing--brown eyes once more.  
  
"Look, Squall... you could have just told me that you weren't paying attention."  
  
"Oh, that would go over -wonderfully-," Squall muttered under his breath.  
  
"There you go again," Rinoa said. Her hands had subconsciously gone to her hips, and she leaned   
over to face him head-on a little in that way of hers. "Just say it out loud, Squall. I mean...   
that's what normal people do. Talk. You know, I've seen you do it. What goes through that head   
of yours?" She tapped a temple in accent, and straightened a little, before saying, just as he   
opened his mouth:  
  
"Whatever."  
  
"I dunno." Squall said at the same time. It took him forever to do it, but he figured them all   
out. The trademark line had been dropped from his vocabulary, and as Rinoa's smug knowingness   
dropped into a tight-lipped little frown, he found himself matching it with a slow-spreading   
grin that went from one side of his face to another.  
  
"I'm learning," He said, as he set an arm across her shoulders and started walking her back   
into the Garden. Rinoa balled her hands into fists and pounded them playfully into his side, and   
he laughed in a way that he had been doing a lot more lately.   
  
Who knew? Maybe he was learning something after all.  
  
  
  
"Aaanggh! Aaagh! Aaangh-agngh!"  
  
Quistis Trepe leaned up against the dorm room wall in that sleek and elegant way of hers,   
looking down at her fingernails in a manner that seemed as calm as could be. Only someone who   
knew her ways well would be able to tell that the gesture was impatient.  
  
"Aaanngh! Aaag!"  
  
"Zell, give the bag a break, okay?" Quistis said. "And no, not literally--Ah-ah! She -can-   
crack a joke. Imagine that." Dull, flat, and as dry as it could be. The woman didn't even   
look up from her nails.   
  
Zell dropped his fists and looked over his shoulder at her in a cold and uncharacteristically   
solemn way. And then, after that brief moment, he danced a little from foot to foot and planted   
a firm punch to the worn and beaten bag in front of him. Dust flew, its supports groaned, and   
Zell sent out another little sound from between his teeth. Quistis sighed.  
  
"Look, Zell, Selphie sent me up here to talk this through--"  
  
"You?" He said within a bitter laugh and a rounding kick at the pitiful-looking punching bag.   
"What are -you- going to do? Read to me?"  
  
Quistis crossed her arms over her chest. "I resent that."  
  
Zell rolled his eyes and his body followed, turning to fully face her. He spread his arms out a   
little, and then sighed and dropped them again in a manner that was very quite frustrated.   
"Look, it's just tough, Quistis."  
  
She offered no response. Obviously, the woman expected more than that.  
  
"I mean, aren't you -bored- out of your freakin' -mind-?!" He exclaimed. Never one to stand   
still for more than a millisecond, he began throwing out gestures left and right. "I haven't   
beaten anything up in -months-!"  
  
"Gee, that's civilized."  
  
Zell ignored her. "I mean, it's great that peace is here and everything. But... Quistis, I've   
been trained for my whole life to..." He waved his hands around in exasperation.  
  
"...Fight?"  
  
"Thank you."  
  
"No problem."   
  
"I've gone to the training center. It isn't the same. I'm just throwing punches. There's   
nothing behind it, no reason. It's not like I want a world crisis, but... Look at me, look!"   
He tapped his ratty t-shirt covered chest with both hands. "I'm still sleeping in my dorm room   
at the Garden, damn it. Is this what my life is going to be from now on?"  
  
"Not neces--"  
  
"Game over, Quisty. Game -over-." He reached over knocked his hover-board onto the ground,   
stepping onto it in the same motion. His feet locked into place, and with a twist of his back   
heel the jets snapped and flared, sending him floating a few feet off the ground. He swayed   
back and forth a little, with his jaw cocked and body shifting with his movements. In his eyes   
was a defiant chill.   
  
"You can't fly that in here."  
  
"Why not," Zell said. "After all, I'm -graduated-." He lifted his hands and did a little   
quote-quote motion with his fingers, as sarcastic as could be. Quistis shifted her hips and   
ran her tongue along the sharper edges of her teeth. Unaffected.   
  
"I think you've had a little too much time to think to yourself, Zell."   
  
"That's the problem! Weren't you -listening-?!"   
  
Quistis touched her fingertips to her forehead tiredly. They were cold, like ice. "Look, Zell...  
when the Garden is back up..."  
  
Rocking back and forth still, Zell watched her with exaggerated snakelike motions of the head.   
Left, right, left, right. His eyes widened. Quistis resisted an urge to go for his throat and   
clenched her arms across her chest -- this time in order to keep them from doing something that   
they weren't supposed to do.   
  
"When the Garden is back up," She went on, "We're all to be on the faculty."  
  
"The -faculty-?!" Zell exclaimed. "After all that we did, they offer us positions on the   
-faculty-?!"  
  
Quistis cocked her head to one side and cast him a chilled look. "Gee, I guess you could always   
sell your medal for world peace when you're starving and homeless..."  
  
"Exactly! You say that as if it's a -bad- thing!"  
  
She'd gotten the compulsion to slap her forehead a number of times that afternoon -- at that   
response, she took a moment to do so. Accenting the gesture was an exasperated sigh. "I think   
it's a good idea, Zell. We've experienced a lot, all of us... and a chance to teach what we've   
learned is one that we should take."  
  
"Heh. I thought you gave up on the whole instructor bit."  
  
"That was a time of crisis," Quistis said haughtily, complete with an upward tilt of her chin.   
"However, those times have passed... There are times to take up arms, and times to take up   
pens--"  
  
"Oh, Jeez." Zell groaned. "Pens? I passed the SeeD exam. I don't need to hear that kind of   
stuff anymore." He twisted his feet and did a little spin on his still-raised hover-board,   
flapping his arms and frowning childishly.  
  
"That attitude is going to be the end of you, Zell."  
  
"Yeah?" He wavered and came to a shaky halt. Steadying himself in the air, he managed to meet   
her gaze and match it defiantly. "Tell me, Quistis -- do you still have your Guardian Force   
junctioned?"  
  
"Huh?" Quistis cocked an eyebrow at him.  
  
"Well, do you? It's a simple question."  
  
"Well..." Quistis shifted from side to side, in the manner of a proud bird ruffling its   
feathers. "If you must know..."  
  
"Ha!" Knowing full well what her answer was just by looking at her, he jabbed a finger in the   
air--sending him shifting backwards on his board a little--with great and pointed triumph. "My   
point -exactly-. You miss it as much as I do. You're just as aching to get into some action   
as I am."  
  
"Nonsense!" Quistis retorted indignantly. "You don't see -me- moping, do you?"  
  
"I know you," Zell said. "Deep inside, you are. I bet you sneak into the parking lot at night   
and send Quezacotl out after empty beer cans."  
  
"Oh come -on-," Quistis said flatly.   
  
"Come on? No. -Go- on, yes." Zell gave his heel another clockwise twist, and with a hiss he   
jetted forward. "I'm outta here." As he passed he flashed her peace and winked in cold   
amusement. "Later, toots."  
  
Quistis rolled her eyes. "...And, if you must know, Guardian forces do more than just kill   
things."  
  
"Gee, a little defensive, there?"  
  
"It's true," Her head subtly followed him as he crossed the room. "Health, dexterity,   
intelligence... I can see that -you- haven't experimented much with that one."  
  
"What's -that- supposed to mean?!" Zell cried, just as his head smacked into the top of the   
doorway. With a resounding crack he was knocked back and off his hover-board, only to thud   
painfully onto the tiled floor below. The board went zipping forward, and after a moment of   
silence snapped into the other side of the hallway outside.  
  
Quistis's lips went into a neat little circle, and she pointedly gave a low whistle and rolled   
her eyes off to one side, before throwing a few false coughs into her fist.  
  
"Oh, just shut up and help me twist my shoulder back into its socket."   
  
  
  
Squall plucked a flower up from the earth in front of him and brought it to his eyes. In his   
gloved fingers he turned it in a small circle. The thin white petals blurred and became a   
single unit, and with a curious, almost animal-like narrow of his eyelashes he watched...   
Mesmerized? Perhaps.  
  
"Squall?"  
  
The whirring came to a complete halt, and the petals individual digits. His silvery blue gaze   
shifted and his focus went behind the flower -- Rinoa. She was sitting across from him, her   
legs spread open as if she were preparing to stretch, although she had apparently opted to   
relax instead. Around them was the grass, waving in rhythm to an undetectable beat, and beyond   
that the edge of a forest and the Garden, glowing and radiant... and somewhat out of place in   
this setting.  
  
Her hands were lifted, level with her chest, and Squall noted that a flower just like his own   
was intertwined within her fingers. At this recognition she cast him a small smile and said,   
"Thanks for coming out here with me... I know you're busy and everything."  
  
"Yeah." Squall replied absentmindedly. Naturally, he enjoyed their time together... but a lot   
of things were on his mind, especially with the Garden being renovated. There was talk of him   
becoming an instructor... or worse. It was hard enough being a 'leader.' At that, a little smirk  
came onto his lips. Bitter.  
  
Rinoa tipped her head slightly to one side, and she lowered her hands to the ground. "What are   
you thinking about, Squall?"  
  
"Nothing." He replied reflexively. However, he saw that Rinoa had wiltered a little at his   
response. Quickly, he rushed to correct himself. "About the future, actually. I mean, what's   
going to become of us, and the Garden... I mean, it's like turning to the last page of a book   
and finding out that there are thousands of blank pages to fill, you know?"  
  
"Yeah." Rinoa said. That undertone was still there. He'd answered her question, what more did   
she want from him? And then Squall saw that her eyes weren't on him at all... Rather, they had   
fallen into her lap. He felt his stomach draw tight, and there was a quiet click as his lips   
parted... closed... parted...  
  
"What's wrong?" He finally asked.  
  
Rinoa's eyes flickered up to him. She looked guilty. "I just..."  
  
How long had she been waiting to talk to him about... whatever it was? How many times had she   
looked at him that way, only for him to get self-conscious and wonder what -he-had been doing   
wrong, as opposed to thinking about what was going through -her- head. Rinoa had feelings, too.  
  
But she never hid them. She always told him everything. Had he ever seen her eyes shielded from   
him? Ever? Now, he wondered.  
  
"...The Garden..." Rinoa was saying. "I mean, you have your rank and your friends and   
classmates... You're a SeeD, Squall, and you'll always have that to go back to..."  
  
She had paused to look him in the eyes. Squall matched her gaze, unaccustomed to the etiquette   
of 'spilling one's emotions.' It took him a moment to realize that he was supposed to nod.   
Funny, actually -- why -wouldn't- he be listening to her? There was no need to assure her.   
Nevertheless...  
  
....Rinoa was satisfied. "But it's all over for me. You did your job, Squall. You fulfilled   
your contract--"  
  
"Contract? I haven't heard that one in a while." Squall said.  
  
Rinoa smiled a little. "And you'll never hear it again. It's over, Squall. But I don't know   
what to do with myself, now. There's no reason to go back to Timber, and you know how me and   
my father are..."  
  
Squall straightened a little. "But... I thought we... I thought you'd decided to stay here?"  
  
Did he look... frightened? Rinoa cocked her head at him a little, and was a little slow in   
responding. "Well, I... I guess. But Squall, what am I going to do here? Wander the halls? I   
didn't grow up here, like you did."  
  
"You can take the exams, Rinoa. I mean, I'm sure they'll pull a few strings..."  
  
Her jaw dropped and this strange look had come into her eyes. Squall met them, but in his   
peripheral vision he saw the flower head in her first snap and drop from her suddenly increased   
grip. "Are you serious, Squall? You really think... Squall, that's awful!"  
  
"What?"  
  
"I wouldn't want to 'pull a few strings' to get anywhere. Do you know how -terrible- that would   
make me feel? I want to earn my way, and get what I deserve. How could you suggest something   
like that...as if it actually seems -right- to you...?" She sounded stupefied, aghast.  
  
"Well..." Squall, always a contrast to her, calmly shrugged. "Then do the training and take the   
exams just like everyone else."  
  
Rinoa blinked at this, unable to rant at him while he was so serene about it all. "I... well,   
maybe. I don't know if it's right for me, though, Squall... I've said this already, I don't   
like fighting, it's just not in my nature... and SeeD... Well..."  
  
Squall put a hand on his forehead in a rare dramatic gesture. "Are you -ever- satisfied," He   
said within a playful and exaggerated groan. Riona's jaw dropped, and from that she managed a   
rather bewildered laugh.  
  
"My goodness, Squall... was that a touch of...character?"  
  
He laughed a little -- not merrily, of course, it was not his way. But still he laughed, and   
shook his head a little. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry..."  
  
"Don't be," Rinoa had risen in that lithe way of hers -- funny, the way she moved could so   
easily be clumsy, but yet it was not that way in the least. Somehow, she had gotten to her   
hands and knees and crawled toward him, before flopping onto the shelf that his crossed-legs   
made, folding her arms and resting her chin in their niche. In that fashion, she gazed up at   
him.  
  
She was so pretty. Squall shifted so that his hands were behind him on either side, and leaned   
back a little. He watched her with a scrutinizing gaze, inspecting and observant... Like this,   
they exchanged thoughts and words that conversation would never have covered with their   
differences, and with the fur collar of his coat blowing against his chin, Squall thought:  
  
"What is it?" Rinoa asked.  
  
Squall thought, having forgotten that he had allowed Rinoa access into his head. He broke   
their gaze and looked off into the distance, feeling her eyes on him like heat against his   
jawline...   
  
"You..." He started.  
  
"Yes?" She urged him.  
  
"You... care for me, Rinoa." He croaked. This was a very difficult thing for him to say -- it   
was hard enough to admit his own feelings, much less openly announce someone else's...   
especially concerning him. Riona's face warmed at the comment.   
  
"...But everyone is always telling me to open up, to show my feelings, to show... well,   
myself... And when I think about it, I wonder... What do you see in me, Rinoa? What made you   
feel the way you do?"  
  
This, actually, caught her a little by surprise. Squall watched her head sink into her arms a   
little, her eyes shift off to one side -- was she thinking, he mused, or avoiding him? Across   
her face came a strand of obsidian-hued hair, against her nose almost in the same position as   
the scar that crossed Squall's own. He had a sudden compulsion to brush it away, but feared   
that it would take her attention from the question at hand. It wasn't true that he had been   
thinking of it a -lot- lately, but when it came to mind... It was suddenly very important to   
him.  
  
"It's frustrating, Squall, how you sometimes hide yourself from everybody. It really hurts me   
sometimes." She finally said, honestly so, although she was looking at the necklace that hung   
low on his chest rather than his face at this point. "At first, it really bothered me, you   
know. I wanted to understand you so badly, wanted to know what was behind those eyes of yours...   
but as things unfolded, I kinda realized... This -is- you, Squall. I mean, I was always trying   
to look deeper than what was actually there, and never gave myself a chance to actually -see-   
you, you know...  
  
"I wanted you to be yourself, I guess. But then I realized...Who else can you be?"  
  
Her eyes rose and flickered into his own. Squall's heart skipped a beat at the mere sight of it.   
And, although he felt a sudden inner warmth at what she told him, he still knew... Rinoa had   
yet to have answered his question. She knew this, however, could see it in his eye just as   
clearly as she would have if he had told her straight out. Her gaze lowered, she nodded vaguely   
against her arms, and her lips parted:  
  
"I've actually thought about this for a long time. I've always -liked- you, Squall, for what   
you've done for me. Annoyances and all, you were sent to be my hero... and that's what you did.   
You've saved my life, you've saved so much for me. Whenever I was in trouble, you'd be there..."  
  
An arm snaked out from where it was folded, and her white fingers tapped at the outside of his   
thigh. "When I first came to the Garden, Squall... I was looking for Seifer. He did a lot for   
me, too, and I was attracted to him for it."  
  
Seifer. Squall felt his heart grow cold at the mention of the man's name -- and, of course, the   
fact that Rinoa spoke of a favorable past with him. Holding his tongue and curbing his mind, he   
wet his lips and looked off to one side.  
  
"...When I'd heard that he'd thrown a fit over the fact that only three of you were sent to   
help me... I felt so much for him for that, Squall. And when he came to Timber himself, just to   
fight for me, to act as a knight for me... He did exactly what you did. He may have failed, but   
he tried to be my hero."  
  
"But Squall -- I don't -love- him, do you understand? I'd spent time with him, yes, but... It   
just doesn't feel right. When I met you, I just was... comfortable, Squall. For the first time   
since my childhood I was content, content in a way that made me want to stay with you... Not   
just for a while, but... Forever, Squall. It just feels so right inside me, all the time. With   
someone else, 'forever' would scare me. But with you... the thought of losing this is what is   
terrifying. Sometimes it's frustrating, this relationship... but I don't regret it. I never   
will."  
  
...She'd said too much. Rinoa felt a twinge of worry at that, but as her nature decreed she   
willed herself not to fret. It was how she felt, and she wasn't going to hold back, not unless   
she had to. He'd asked, and she'd told. Watching his face, or rather his profile as he had cast   
it off to the side, she waited for a reaction.  
  
"...Does that answer your question?" She asked tentatively, when nothing came.  
  
"Uh..." Squall's torso twisted a little as he eased his weight off one arm put his hand over   
his mouth, drawing it downward. "Um, yeah..." At that came an uncomfortable little laugh,   
lilting his words. Rinoa stared up at him, not sure what to think -- this was one shell that   
she didn't want to crack. Bashfully, she shifted to rise up and away from him.  
  
"Rinoa..." Impulsively, he took her wrist. It was gentle, yes, without a touch of force or   
meaning behind it... nothing, of course, but an apology... If a simple touch could actually   
express something like that. "You've said so many times, that I've saved you, that I've been   
your your hero... But, Rinoa...Before I met you, I..." His hair shifted from side to side,   
although his head barely moved -- shaking it, unable to express himself. He was, after all, not   
gifted in that regard. "...Thank you. Thank you so much."  
  
Her eyes crinkled, in a smile that was only slightly able to extend to the lips. She snaked her   
wrist out of his hold and twined her fingers into his own. It was one of those moments again,   
where they could understand each-other without words, where the air between them seemed to warm   
and draw into itself, until they were face to face...  
  
Rinoa's upper lip grazed his lower one, and at that sensation he drew back from her slightly,   
enough for their mouths to warm just from the nearness, but not with touch. With a tiny, almost   
playful grin he said in a teasingly normal tone of voice. "Why is it that people kiss, anyway?   
What's so great about pressing two faces against one another?"  
  
She rolled her eyes, let loose a heaving sigh, and plopped her cheek down onto his shoulder   
with exaggerated and mock disdain. "Always the romantic." And her eyes closed as his hand   
crinkled against the hair at the back of her head where he placed it. "It just feels good,   
Squall. It just feels good."  
  
The breeze blew the scents of the meadow across his face, and within it Rinoa intermingled,   
pushing his tresses back from his eyes and cooling the flesh upon his face. His side relaxed   
where she rested against him, and he felt the subtle movements of her body rising and falling,   
inhaling, exhaling....  
  
"It most certainly does," he said.  
  
  
  
  
End Part 1/?  
To be Continued.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	3. Part Two

"In a minute, dear   
Love holds second   
It'll come clear   
Do you see pity?   
Do you see love?   
Ride away, dear love   
Dash away   
No-one hears you call   
Do you see pity?   
Do you see love?"  
--James Iha  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part II  
  
  
Location: The Time of the Sixth World  
Two Eternities Before the Present Day  
  
  
For the life of her, she couldn't even remember who she was anymore.  
  
Clutching at the sides of her face in the manner of a madwoman, the young girl ran blindly   
across the forest floor. Her feet pounded hollowly and askew in the manner of a flippant   
heartbeat, and tendrils of thin dark hair clung to her cheeks and wound about her bony fingers   
like weedy black veins. She looked like a mess -- but was at the spite of composure when it   
came to what was ripping through her mind.  
  
"Stop!" She wailed. The word was only one syllable, but she stretched it so that it covered   
many more. Starting out in a low hiss, she slowly slid her breathless tone into a wail and   
screamed as if she were being skinned alive. No one could hear her -- well, no one ever came to   
her rescue, anyway. A person could not be saved from herself after all.  
  
She didn't know who she was. Yes, her parents had called her Kei. She had been born in a city   
called Jidoa and had been raised there for much of her life. Fifteen years old, if even that.   
That was only a small part of the whole, however, for since birth she had known it, the   
unavoidable truth:  
  
There was another part of her. Another part entirely. Something that was not Kei.  
  
Kei had been born with the gift of magic. In a world of science and technology this was a   
terrible gift to have, and the child worked so very, very hard to hide it. But all was in vain   
that fateful morning, the morning that she, having finally fallen mad... was discovered. The   
other side of her had grown too difficult for her to contain.  
  
A witch, they'd said. The girl is a witch! She was no longer Kei, child of Jidoa. She was an   
object, a thing.   
  
How it infuriated her! Just the thought of it made her feet move faster, her chest huff harder,   
her face pinch up under her hands as if it were recoiling in disgust. It wasn't fair! She   
hadn't asked for this! What was it, that made one person different than another? What was it,   
that gave her this curse!  
  
Her steps carried her west. West was her only hope. Kei did not yet know that she had a   
continent to cross, and then an ocean afterwards... It wouldn't have mattered if she did. The   
girl had nowhere else to go but west. The other half of her knew this, and Kei learned this   
from her other half. She hated it, she trusted it, but she also sensed its apprehension in   
going this way. She sensed its fear.  
  
"I'll get you for this." She hissed. She had run only fifteen minutes, but this was in a sprint   
and she was beginning to feel dizzy. Her hands dropped away from her face and clutched at the   
trees as she passed them, as if touch would steal a touch of their life for herself. It didn't   
seem to work. Still she tired, and with a mask of her matted and tear-soaked hair she ran on.  
  
"I'll get you." Kei said.  
  
"You already have me," Rattled her other half.  
  
"I want you -out-," Kei said.  
  
"I'll bring you with me."  
  
And, just as that voice snapped its retort in her head her feet strangled themselves in some   
foliage and tore away. A moment of silent panic hit her, slowed her so that she was fully aware  
that she was falling. In half of an instant she was down, cracking her chin on a fallen log and   
shredding her hands up the palms, having the breath knock back from her belly and ram its fist   
into her spine.  
  
Sobbing and choking on her sobs, Kei lie there for a moment, stunned. She knew that she was   
going to die, perhaps not now but soon, and the eternity that it took her to get her lungs   
un-collapsed was a bitter reminder of this. Throughout this entire ordeal she could feel the   
smug knowingness of her other half.  
  
"Leave me alone," She sniffled in the ghost of a whisper.  
  
"Stand up."  
  
"Stand up."  
  
"Stand -up-!"  
  
Kei let out a strangled cry and submitted enough to get herself into a seated position. Her   
hands were beginning to burn, and the inky dirt that had gotten warped into her flesh accented   
the redness of her blood. It hurt, it hurt so very much. Why was it that a witch... Oh, how the   
word burned at her mind!...had to feel pain, too? Atop of everything else, why did she have to   
hurt?!  
  
"Get up." Her other half said.  
  
"Why?" Kei asked bitterly. "Why bother?"  
  
"They're after you."  
  
"Let them come after me."  
  
"They'll kill you."   
  
Kei knew that she was already dead. It wasn't like she stood a chance here, in this life. It   
was inevitable. However, the prospect of her family, her friends... people she had known and   
loved... hunting her down like this was miserable. Even her own father, terrified by the   
prospect that she could do her family harm, had jabbed an accusing finger at him after her   
Madness came that morning.  
  
The other half of her had finally broken out. It had spoken so that everyone could hear.  
  
"Let them kill me." She said. But Kei had hesitated, and her other half knew it.  
  
It needed not persuade further. The hunting party did that. Kei's head shot up at the sound of   
branches cracking and voices. There's her trail, she went this way! Kei recognized the voice as   
a man from her village. He had a son; she had played with him frequently. They had gotten close,   
although their entire friendship was slaughtered by fear. She had turned to him that morning,   
desperate for help, and he had shied away.  
  
"-Run-," Her other half hissed.  
  
Scrambling to her feet, Kei pushed off with a heel before she even gained her balance. Stumbling   
over the log and then into a shaky run, she pushed off farther into the forest. This was her   
only chance, yes, but it was also her mistake. The hunting party was close. She could hear them,   
even with the voice in her head and her ears clogged with her misery. They, of course, could   
hear her in turn.  
  
"There she is!" A voice called. Kei could almost feel the dozen of them snap into attention.   
Knowing that it was lost, she did not hide the wail from climbing up her throat and out of her   
upturned mouth; it filled the air like a pathetic and animalistic shriek. Inhuman.  
  
In plain view now, a figure of white against the dark backdrop of the forest, she knew what was   
coming. It did. The first arrow whizzed by her ear, the result of hurried and fearful marksman   
ship, and with another uncloaked cry she ducked--long after the shot was fired--and dipped in   
another direction. Another arrow pounded into the ground in front of her, and she scurried away   
from it at an angle, as if it radiated death itself.  
  
Thus weaving through the unpaved wilderness, she was pursued. They were faster than she was;   
more calm, and Kei relied only on her terror to guide her. Her heart pounded in her chest so   
hard that it hurt, that it pressed against her lungs and closed them... She managed to gain a   
few yards before her vision went out, until she was running with only a few spots of clarity to   
peer through like tiny holes in a black shroud.   
  
"Hurry!" Her other half said. "-Move-!"  
  
This was a pointless thing to demand -- this was exactly what Kei was doing. Because of that   
statement, Kei knew in the back of her mind that her other half was just as afraid as she was.  
  
And then, suddenly, there was nothing beneath the toes of her right foot. Kei knew that this   
time she was not merely tripping over a few vines. Her body, out of her control, kept moving   
despite the fact that she screamed for it not to. And then, with a puff, she fell and hit her   
chest on the opposite side of a small crevice in the earth. Desperately, wide-eyed, she felt   
her weight pull her down into the pit with a rush. Fingernails straining back against the   
sinews that held them to her hands, she caught herself dangling just when she thought that it   
was hopeless, that she would have fallen and ended it all there.  
  
Not that, of course, she gained any luck.  
  
Clinging to the edge of the hole with her breasts along the rim, she strained to heave herself   
fully out of the nature-made trap. However, at her angle she could gain no foothold, and was   
not strong enough to rely on her arms alone. It didn't matter, however. She was too late. With   
a rush of her fear-induced senses she heard the sound of footsteps coming to an abrupt   
halt--even now, with her helpless, they were afraid to venture too close to a witch--and   
arrows scraping against quivers. Bowstrings.  
  
The first arrow struck the ground by her hand. The second impaled her above her right shoulder   
blade. The third thudded into the center of her back. After that, she lost track of what she   
felt and where she felt it.  
  
She was going to die.  
  
"Fall." Her other half said through her lips.  
  
And Kei, knowing that this was the end, released her meager hold on the small crevice lip.  
  
  
  
  
End Part 2/?  
To be Continued.  



	4. Part Three

"Do you have the time  
To listen to me whine  
About everything and anything a man wants  
I am one of those   
Melodramatic fools  
Neurotic to the bone  
No doubt about it."  
--Green Day  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part III  
  
  
"That's crazy." Irvine Kinneas said.  
  
"Think how great it'll be!" Zell said in reply, totally oblivious to any speck of hesitation   
coming from the gangly, jeans-clad man. Irvine crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back   
against the wall, eyeing the duo in front of him. He had discarded his trench coat and hat for   
a t-shirt and a simple ponytail. A single strand hung down from over his temple and across his   
chest -- Selphie's work.  
  
Selphie, incidentally, was the next to speak. "C'mon, Irvine! What else are we going to do?"   
Her words jilted and shook as if she were a pile of stones atop of a vibrating tray. This was,   
of course, due to the way she bounced up and down on her toes in order to beg him. Her thin   
little hands were clasped in front of her chest, her eyes squeezed shut, and her hair danced.   
"Pleaaase? For me?"  
  
"And me," Zell piped in, although he wasn't quite as appealing as Selphie was.   
  
"Okay, let's just say that I'm game--"  
  
"Woo-hoo!" Selphie cried.  
  
Irvine cleared his throat. Her arms dropped to her side and she pulled down a shade of peaceful   
quiet. "I mean, yeah... Let's just say that you are game."  
  
Irvine unwound one arm from the other, which remained against his chest, and splayed out his   
fingers expressively, palm-up. His mouth opened, calm and cool... Totally prepared to offer a   
brilliant reason why the adventure wouldn't work, would fail, would be a waste of time... There   
was plenty to work with, but Irvine suddenly found himself speechless, as if an invisible hand   
had gripped his tongue.   
  
"Well," He said, closing his fist and re-folding it across his chest with the other arm. "I   
guess I am game. Kinda. Sorta." His blue eyes flared up and he twisted a finger in their   
direction all of a sudden. "But you're never going to convince everyone else."  
  
"Wanna bet?" Zell asked smugly.  
  
"...No." Irvine replied.  
  
  
  
"A challenge?" Squall asked.  
  
"A -real- challenge." Zell said.  
  
Selphie pounded a hand into her fist. Irvine acted as a third posse member, but said nothing.   
He had retrieved his hat, and took that moment to pull it down low over his eyes. They were in   
the elevator, going down from the second floor. The three of them had followed Squall in and   
cornered him there. Selphie had ever-so-cleverly plotted this.  
  
"...I don't know." Squall said.  
  
"Sheesh, is that your answer to -everything-?" Zell huffed.  
  
Squall frowned and tapped the corner of the wall above the keypad, waiting for the blasted   
elevator to release him. Selphie saw this and quickly went in for the kill. "Aren't you   
-bored-, Squall? I mean, they're going to stick us in -classrooms- when the next term starts...   
They may as well clip a ball and chain to each of our ankles..."   
  
The elevator pinged and the door hissed open. Squall strode out without much of a pause or a   
glance. Relentless, the trio stayed at his heels. As a unit they made their way down the   
staircase. No single footstep could be distinguished for another. At this constant   
tap-tap-tapping sound Squall finally looked back over his shoulder and heaved a   
defeated-sounding sigh.  
  
"Let me get this straight," He said. "You want us to fly out to Centra..." Out of the corner of   
his eye he saw them all bob their heads empathetically. Pursing his lips a little at this, he   
took a breath and continued, "...and hunt down some weak Guardian Force in the mountains that   
no one, since the dawn of its discovery, cares to capture?"  
  
"Well gee, if you put it -that- way," Selphie said.  
  
"Hey!" Zell exclaimed. "It may not be Ultimecia, but it's something!"  
  
"Besides," Squall said, ignoring him. "Acquiring a Guardian Force is part of the SeeD exam,   
isn't it?" This, of course, was a pointed and rhetorical question. "It'd be a little selfish of   
us to just run out and take another of those things off the map."  
  
"He has a point," Irvine said.  
  
"...We can put it back when we're done," Selphie suggested meekly.  
  
Zell wasn't so easily swayed. "I checked it out with the Xu beforehand." He said. Xu was   
usually the one who dealt with the Guardian Forces, she having the most experience and training   
when it came to them. Squall, however, didn't look impressed. Irvine was looking at the ceiling   
and Selphie was doing the opposite -- gazing down at her feet.  
  
"What's -wrong- with you guys?!" Zell exclaimed all of a sudden. The image was something better   
suited for nightmares. There they were, in a boring air-conditioned training building... and   
not giving a damn about it.  
  
"Don't you miss it? Just a little... I mean, looking out the window of the Rangnarok and seeing   
the ocean spilling out beneath you, the rush of adrenaline as you feel a monster's voice   
rumbling across the knots in your stomach. That surge, when you slam your fist into some   
creatures hide--"  
  
"--And the way that the feeling of victory can wash every bruise and scrape right off of your   
mind," A voice interjected. Zell looked to his left to see that Rinoa had fallen into step   
behind him. Her willowy fingers were wound around a green coffee mug, and when their eyes   
met a little smile flickered into her irises in that quietly warm way of hers.  
  
Zell flashed a grin at set his arm around her shoulders. "Did I ever tell you that I love you,   
Riona? I do." Rinoa beamed and shifted her weight as he playfully shook her back and forth a   
little.  
  
"Well, I take it Rinoa is in, then." Selphie said cheerfully. Rinoa glanced over at the girl in   
the process of brushing a strand of hair behind one ear, and then looked to Squall and Irvine   
curiously.  
  
Squall cleared his throat. "They want to fight some no-name Gua--"  
  
"We -want-," Zell interrupted pointedly. "To face a challenge."  
  
Rinoa stiffened a little under Zell's hold at this -- describing the sensation of battle was   
one thing, but actually going through with it... What part of the conversation had she missed?   
Zell, misinterpreting the tension for his close-contact, gave her a sheepish little half-grin   
and put his hands down into his pockets.   
  
Squall, however, was a little more observant. He watched her eyes until their gazes met, and   
they looked silently at each-other until her head rose and fell in the barest glimmer of a nod,   
and her lips subtly upturned in a vapor-like smile.  
  
A little terse, Squall crossed his arms and looked at Zell, who was facing everyone but Rinoa.   
He could feel Selphie's eyes burning at his cheek on one side, and Irvine's at another. Did they   
really need his approval? It was a little bothersome, really, although when he thought about   
it...  
  
...It was just a stupid little adventure. Why fret about it?  
  
"Woo-hoo!" Selphie cried, before he could even say anything. She'd seen the shift in his eyes,   
the slackening of his jaw that stated that Squall had given up. Zell broke into a grin and   
punched at the air. Squall, however, simply looked at Rinoa's reaction. She pushed out a little   
smile and gripped her coffee mug as Zell clapped her on the back -- Squall was offered the   
tiniest of winks for his concern-filled efforts, and then Selphie was stealing the show again   
with that exuberance of hers, like a blazing aura.  
  
"We've got almost got the whole gang," She said. "Wow, I bet I'm going to get sore calves from   
this!" By looking at her peppy face, one would have guessed that she was talking about the   
greatest thing on the planet.  
  
"Humph," Zell said, crossing his arms and cocking an indignant eyebrow in her direction.   
"You're going to get more than that," As if this prospect were even better. Mind-boggling,   
even. Selphie broke into the widest and most radiant of grins. From one side came a vaugely   
exhasperated sigh from Irvine.  
  
Selphie playfully stuck her tongue out him, and with little-or-no-hesitation he mimicked her   
with an equally twisted expression. She wrinkled her nose at him and returned the smile that   
had fallen onto his face.  
  
"...Quistis." Squall was saying.  
  
"Huh?" Selphie and Irvine straightened, and Zell rolled his eyes at them.  
  
"Have you guys talked to Quistis, yet?" Squall repeated. Zell had a smug smile on his face,   
having heard him the first time and wanting him to say it again. Squall had complied, although   
he cast the other young man a level look in doing so.  
  
"Look at this, isn't it great?" Zell said, once he had everyone's attention. "-Someone- sounds   
excited. Don't glare at me like that, Squall. I know what I'm talking about -- I can read   
through that monotone of yours better than anyone. You're looking forward to this."  
  
Squall opened his mouth.  
  
"Whatever." Everyone chimed in, as if they held group rehearsals for this sort of thing.  
  
"...Maybe." Squall said flatly.  
  
"Oh, he's a quick one, he is," Irvine said with a little tip of his hat. Squall offered a   
sarcastic and tight-lipped little smile in return. Gee, thanks.  
  
"Okay," Zell said, after this small affair had ended. "We've got the easy ones down."  
  
"Easy?I thought Squall was the hard one?" Selphie said.  
  
"Wasn't I the hard one?" Irvine said.  
  
Zell fluttered his hand.. "Nevermind that! You guys were easier than I thought, okay. Lets all   
cartwheel for joy." Sarcastic, sure, but only as sarcastic as Zell could get when he was in a   
good mood. "Anyway, all we have to do now is saw through the collar that Garden had put around   
Qusity's neck, and we're home free."  
  
"Collar? How quaint."  
  
Selphie and Irvine, who had been coughing and pointing over Zell's shoulder at that point, both   
turned around quickly and innocently as the clicking of Quistis Trepe's boots came to a firm   
halt just behind himself and Riona. Even Squall found a corner to put his attention into.  
  
"Oh, I--" Zell, having whirled around to find himself face-to-face with the blonde instructor,   
stammered out a reply without really having much to stay. Quistis, who was one to rather enjoy   
such confrontations, simply put her hands on her hips and cocked her head expectantly. Riona let  
out a low whistle and examined her feet.  
  
"Well, 'collar' is a metaphor, you see."  
  
"Uh-huh." Quistis said dryly.  
  
"...For having a barb up your ass, you know." Her arms had dropped, and Zell quickly lifted his   
own, raising his hands defensively. "Kidding, Quisty! I'm kidding! You know I love you! You do,   
you do. Don't glare at me like that."  
  
"Look," Selphie said. "Zell's got this great idea..."  
  
"...And doesn't know how keen you'll be on it, you know?" Irvine added.  
  
Quistis looked away the latter two and back to Zell again. Her brown eyebrows rose expectantly.   
Zell, realizing that he had just been pushed onto the soap-box, raised his chin a little and   
adjusted his t-shirt. "There's a Guardian Force on the Centra continent. I've got an okay for   
us all to go out, just like old times, and capture it."  
  
"For strictly educational reasons, of course." He added after a pause, for good measure. This   
was Quistis, after all.  
  
"When?" She asked. Monotone. A closed book. Damn.  
  
"Well, um..." Zell scratched the back of his head. "The day after tomorrow. We'll leave really   
early in the morning. Like, really early." He eyed her. "But not -too- early, if you're   
comfortable with that. Quisty. Dearest."  
  
"Fine." She said. "I've got a meeting at six in the evening. We've got to be back by then."   
And, as if time were suddenly an issue now that she had mentioned it, Quistis looked up to   
find a wall clock, nodded, and started off on her way.  
  
Zell was too stunned to realize his victory.  
  
"Woo-hoo!" Selphie cried.  
  
Even Squall couldn't help a little smile.   
  
"What the hell?" Zell said. "Six o' clock? Quistis! You don't arrange a Great Challenge around   
a meeting, geez! Quistis! Aren't you listening? Quistis Trepe! Yes, you! Quiistis! Damn it, come   
back here! This is a Great Challenge and I -demand- you to take it seriously!"  
  
Irvine watched him run off after Quistis, who hadn't even paused in her departure. He scratched   
the back of his head, under the rim of his hat, and nodded quietly to himself.   
  
"To think, in two days that guy is going to lead us into the unknown."  
  
  
  
  
End Part 3/?  
To be Continued.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	5. Part Four

"Pop Tart  
What's our mission  
Do we know  
But never listen?"  
--The Smashing Pumpkins  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part IV  
  
  
"Let's see," Rinoa said, holding one up. "The white t-shirt, ooor..." She dramatically pushed   
the garment in her other hand forward and announced ever-so-importantly. "The -other- white   
t-shirt? Quick, quick! Make your decision!"   
  
Squall snatched the nearest one from her hand, trying to play the part of not amused. They were   
in his dorm room, where he was changing. The day before had been uneventful, save constant burst   
of joy from Zell and twitters of excitement from everyone else. Even Squall could feel it.   
Gods, could he feel it!  
  
They were to leave the next morning.  
  
Rinoa sat down at the edge of the bed. His open duffel bag rose a little with her weight and   
then settled, and the quilts warped and twisted a little in addition. She put her hands in her   
lap and crossed her ankles, as dainty as could be. Her chin lifted a touch, and she quietly   
watched him pull his shirt over his head and draw it down.   
  
Squall found her watching him, and smiled. Yes, smiled. The prospect of doing something   
different, something like old times, was fetching. Rinoa was fetching. Hell, life itself was   
fetching.  
  
"Gee," Rinoa propped her chin in her hands. "You're certainly glowing tonight."  
  
"Yeah," Squall said. He plopped down next to her on the opposite side of his duffel bag and   
held onto the edge of the bed, leaning over a little. It was strange, just sitting there and   
doing nothing, not having to do anything... He'd always hated it before, but now that he had   
plans, actual adventurous plans in the morning... It made this moment seem all for the better.   
Something to treasure, rather than something to dread.  
  
"I mean, I haven't been in the Ragnarok in ages, Rinoa. And even when I was... I was so   
stressed. I mean, you know what kind of stuff was going on. But tomorrow... We're doing this   
for fun. Fun! Imagine that, huh?"  
  
"Uh-huh."  
  
She didn't sound that bleak or bothered. On the contrary, she was beaming at him. Her eyes   
took him in, and Squall knew that Rinoa was happy because he was happy. He still didn't quite   
understand what she saw in him... but at that moment, he knew what -he- saw in -her-. Rinoa.  
  
"...It isn't going to be that dangerous." He said. She hadn't shown a lot of worry beyond that   
short moment when Zell had first mentioned that to her, and his tone was more frank than it was   
reassuring. "It isn't meant to be dangerous. You know that, right? I wouldn't let you go if it   
were dangerous."  
  
Rinoa rubbed her foot into the ground, looked at it for a moment. "I know. You'd be silent and   
brooding if it were dangerous. Worrying. But you're not. And Squall," She looked over at him.   
"I'm one of you now, right? I mean, I don't feel that out of place any more. I want to do this,   
too. Really, I do."  
  
Squall wasn't so sure that this was true, but he hadn't lied. It wasn't going to be dangerous.   
And he wasn't going to deny Rinoa anything, not if he didn't have to. It was, after all... her   
choice. Whether she chose to go willingly or to simply jump on the bandwagon was her decision.   
He had to respect that...  
  
...And besides, he was so happy. And she looked happy.  
  
He lay back on his bed with his knees crooked over the edge. At the same time Rinoa got to her   
feet, and he watched her move across the room. Slowly his eyes moved, until they could go no   
further... and he rest his cheek on the mattress to allow himself to see her fully. Rinoa had   
crossed to his bookshelf.  
  
With those exaggerated movements of hers that managed to miraculously be graceful, she bent   
over and ran her fingertip along the short row of texts he kept. "Junctioning, the Way of the   
Sword... Magic, Drawing... Why, Squall! These are all course-books!"  
  
"Yeah?" He asked, not caring too much. They'd always been there, after all. Squall remained   
motionless on the bed, with his head turned to face her, and she turned around to offer him a   
short and pointed glance.  
  
"Don't you ever read anything... fun?"  
  
"Fun?"  
  
"You know, novels. Short stories, poetry... That kind of stuff."  
  
"Never had the time, I guess."  
  
"Humph." Rinoa said. Naturally, she wouldn't loose sleep over any of this, but it was in her   
nature to give it all in most everything she did. Even if it was simply taking note of Squall's   
literature-deprival. "You can always find time. I remember, in my father's study... walls and   
walls of books."  
  
She looked at her dirty fingertips. "And they never got dusty."  
  
"Uh-huh." Squall said.  
  
Rinoa lifted her chin a little and declared. "I am going to Dollet and buying you a book. A   
real thick one." She squinted her eyes and wrinkled her nose dramatically. "And if you're too   
lazy to pick it up, I'll sneak into your room in the middle of the night, wake you up, and read   
it to you until you fall asleep again."  
  
"I love you too, Mom."  
  
She sneered playfully at him.   
  
Squall heaved a sigh and turned his head so that he faced the ceiling again, resting with his   
arms folded like a pillow. His ribcage felt tight, the way he was stretched out, and he fought   
a sudden urge to turn out the lights. They could just lay there, staring up, up...  
  
"...If we waited long enough, could we see stars?" He murmured.   
  
"Hmm?" Rinoa asked. She was still by his scantily-clad bookshelf.  
  
"...Nothing. I was just thinking aloud."  
  
Squall could feel Rinoa smiling to herself from across the room. He didn't even need to look at   
her, and he didn't. He could feel her, and he decided that he liked that feeling. "Tomorrow is   
going to be a day to remember, I can feel it."  
  
"So can I," Rinoa replied with a little grin. "We'll all remember that Squall stepped up onto   
the Ragnorok with a half-packed bag."  
  
"It's only one day." Squall replied. "And I'll get to it, we have plenty of time."  
  
"One day?" Her smile. "I thought this was a Great Challenge? Great Challenges have no   
boundaries." She deepened her voice a little in poor but obvious imitation. "Come back here,   
you! This is no laughing matter!"  
  
Squall's chest rose and fell with a good-natured chuckle. Riona beamed and twirled a strand of   
hair around her fingertip. In that motion, she caught sight of something on the bookshelf and   
leaned over a little. The mirth faded from her eyes, but only a little... Curiosity took over.  
  
"What's this?"  
  
"Huh?"  
  
"This book," With her index finger she touched the top of a leather-bound booklet. It was   
black, and seemed a little bit weather-worn at the spine. However, all in all it looked to be   
in very good condition. Almost new, save what had been mentioned.  
  
"I don't know," Squall said. "It doesn't look familiar. Notes, maybe?"  
  
"Notes? To a girlfriend?"  
  
"Of course." He said frankly, before adding in a normal tone of voice. "No, notes from a class   
or something. I don't know."  
  
"Hmm..." Rinoa dropped her hand. The urge to pull it out compelled her, but just as she lifted   
her fingers to go for the booklet again a loud cracking sound reprimanded her, enough to make   
her eyes fly wide and her innards jump under her skin.  
  
"The door."  
  
Someone was knocking.  
  
"Squall? Is Rinoa in there? I hope I'm not disturbing anything." Xu's voice.  
  
"Gee, thanks." Squall huffed, as he rolled off the bed and to his feet. His t-shirt was   
wrinkled and his hair tousled, as if he had been sleeping. Quite aware of this, he tugged and   
patted a little before pulling the door open.  
  
Sure enough, Xu was standing there, impeccable in her smart black uniform. She craned her neck   
to one side, saw Riona standing upright by the bookshelf, and then turned her focus to Squall   
again. He brought his hand down from his hair.  
  
"It's Rinoa. The Headmaster would like her in his office immediately."  
  
  
  
Cid Kramer stood up from behind his desk at the moment the doors open. Xu held it for Rinoa,   
who was followed closely by Squall. He looked bedridden, and had thrown on his SeeD jacket at   
what seemed to have been the last minute. It hung open tiredly, but the man's eyes were sharp.   
Alert. Cid watched him, and then circled his desk in order to usher Rinoa to a seat.  
  
"I'm sorry, my dear -- I know that it's getting late."  
  
Rinoa and Squall exchanged glances.  
  
"Um..." Rinoa bashfully ran her hair behind one ear while seating herself in a chair opposite   
of Cid's own. The man seated himself as well, and offered a small nod to Squall. He did not sit.   
He stood.   
  
Squall was thus right behind and a little to the left of Rinoa, as much a reassurance as an   
addition to the tension. He seemed so anxious, so formal... so worried. It rubbed off on her,   
and she gripped the arms of her seat.  
  
Xu closed the doors.  
  
"What is it?" Squall asked.   
  
"Rinoa." Cid said. He gave Squall a glance, as if to tell him that this was not his burden, and   
then turned a softer gaze onto Rinoa's face. She looked tentative. He tried to look reassuring,   
and spoke very briskly after that. "There's no need for alarm. There's nothing wrong, and   
nothing to worry about."  
  
"...And?" Squall asked.  
  
Sheesh. Cid reminded himself never to get -that- man out of bed.  
  
"We just received a transmission from Esthar. It came directly from the President himself. He   
requested an immediate audience with Miss Heartlilly, and left very little details after that."   
Cid looked over at Rinoa. "If it were urgent or threatening, I'm sure he would have said so. I   
wouldn't even have bothered telling you at this hour, but it seems that President Loire had   
already arranged a means of transportation that leaves early tomorrow. I'd imagine you'd want   
some forewarning."  
  
"....Me? Why me?" Rinoa asked. Squall was wondering the same thing.  
  
"I haven't the slightest. He had mentioned briefly that it was a quite personal matter." Cid   
said. "But I do assure you, he seemed quite at ease in his transmission. There shouldn't be a   
need to worry."  
  
Squall crossed his arms over his chest.  
  
"You will take the four o' clock train from Balamb and travel to Esthar through Fisherman's   
Horizon. They'll be expecting you."  
  
"I'll go with her." Squall said.  
  
"I reiterate," Cid said. "It's not dangerous, Squall. And again, the President had stated that   
this was to be a personal--"  
  
"He'll understand." Squall interjected. "I'll go wit--"  
  
"No, Squall." Rinoa said. She looked up at him over her shoulder. "I don't need you to come   
along. You have things to do tomorrow, remember?"  
  
"But--"  
  
"He said that it's nothing threatening, Squall. You'll be in more danger than I will. Besides,   
I've been through a lot more than a trip to visit an old friend of ours. Right? This should be a   
vacation in comparison."  
  
She was right. Naturally, Squall got quiet. He always got quiet like that when she was right.  
His arms tightened their hold about his chest, winding like a spring. "Esthar has been cleared   
up, hasn't it? It's declared safe?"  
  
"Safer than your dorm room, Squall." Cid said.  
  
Squall frowned.  
  
"Would you be greatly disturbed if I dismissed you?" Cid asked. "I simply need to discuss some   
details with Rinoa, and I feel that it would be a waste of your time. We did drag you out of   
your room for this, after all."  
  
Cid was suggesting, yes, but Squall knew that he was supposed to submit. And, after another   
glance from Riona, he did. However, with that came a burst of anger. Humiliation? Or perhaps it   
was just a manifestation of his concern. With a tight-lipped sigh he straightened a little and   
nodded. "Excuse me, Sir."  
  
"Xu will escort you out."  
  
Squall grit his teeth and turned. Xu, on cue, opened the door for him and followed him outside.   
As she closed it and shut them both out, Squall could see Riona looking at him over her   
shoulder. Cid too, watched... and then they were gone.  
  
"Squall," Xu said, as she led them to the elevator and pushed the down button. "I assure you,   
everything will be fine."  
  
Squall didn't say anything. The door opened. Xu didn't join him as he went inside. However, he   
didn't expect her to. She, after all, had business to deal with. Squall crossed his arms and   
faced her. The door took an extremely long time in sliding shut.  
  
"Well," She said to pass the time. "I do hope you all enjoy your excursion tomorrow. You guys   
certainly deserve a break...especially you, Squall."  
  
Squall nodded at this, and then paused a little. He thought to say something and started to do   
so, but by then the door had started to close and he simply thanked her instead. She nodded a   
response, and then was clipped away with a hiss and slam of the elevator door.  
  
It whirred and rushed down toward the main floor.  
  
Squall's belly dropped. It was probably due to the elevator, but he had his doubts.  
  
  
  
  
  
End Part 4/?  
To be Continued.  
  
  
  
  



	6. Part Five

Discomfort  
endlessly has pulled   
itself upon me   
Distracting/reacting   
I've felt this way before   
So insecure...   
--from "Crawling"  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part V  
  
  
Squall flopped down into one of the seats that lined the window. Everyone knew what was going   
through his head, and because of this they had allowed him his space for a while. However, they   
were nearing their landing point and knew that the situation--especially one that wasn't supposed   
to be dangerous--shouldn't be dampening the mood to -that- degree. No one was foolish enough   
to tell him that openly, but Zell still cast Squall a discrete glare, and Quistis kept her arms   
folded as she looked out the window.  
  
The sea rushed by beneath them.  
  
"Woo!" Selphie cried. "We're almost there!"  
  
"Don't throw your arms up like that!" Irvine cried immediately. "Watch the wheel! The wheel,   
Selphie!"  
  
The Ragnarok jerked a little.  
  
"Geez," Irvine said, holding his hat and waiting for the machine to get back in line. "You, of   
all people, have to be the only one of us who can fly this thing."  
  
"What's -that- supposed to mean," Selphie asked indignantly.  
  
"Don't look at me!" Irvine said. "Look at the controls."  
  
"Oh!"  
  
Quistis pushed herself away from the window. "Okay. We've hit land."  
  
"The way Selphie is driving, I'm not surprised that we haven't literally -hit- land."  
  
"Will you just stop it already," Selphie snapped.  
  
Quistis was unfazed. "As I was saying, we've hit land. That means that we'll be landing   
momentarily." She raised a hand to silence Irvine, who was already two steps ahead in a quip.   
He frowned and slouched, as Quistis had cut him off. "We should plan this out a little,   
shouldn't we?"  
  
"Definitely!" Zell said.  
  
"We should probably divide up into two groups." Quistis said.  
  
Uneven groups, Squall thought. We're missing a person.  
  
"...This is an easier opponent, so the smaller group should probably go in at the front and the   
larger should simply attack from behind. Hit it head on."  
  
"Um..." Zell was obviously uncomfortable on account that Quistis had pressed the 'easy' concept.   
He would have retorted, but something much heavier--and shameful--was obviously weighing on his   
mind. His hand rose a little and his head curled in a tense manner, as if he were trying to hide   
himself somehow. "...One problem with that."  
  
No one questioned Quistis' plans. Stiffening and perking up one eyebrow, she slowly turned her   
head to look at him. Her blue eyes were like ice. "What?"  
  
"...I kinda...um... don't know -exactly- where this thing is?"  
  
"Huh?" Irvine said.   
  
"You mean..."  
  
"...We have to just 'luckily stumble' onto this thing?"  
  
"I -said- that it was going to be a challenge," Zell replied indignantly. "I've got a map of the   
cave, though. Sort of. I had to copy it down, I was kind of in a rush."  
  
"Great. Just great. Do you know how many caves there are in Centra?!"  
  
Squall rubbed the bridge of his nose. "We've dealt with worse. This is supposed to be fun,   
remember?" He didn't sound like he was having much fun, but everyone turned to look at him in   
surprise anyway.  
  
"What?" He asked.  
  
"What...ever?" Zell tried.  
  
"Sure." Squall said. "Whatever."  
  
Even Quistis smiled a little at that one, although her tongue was still in her cheek, a gesture   
of annoyance. Zell cast her a few wary glances until Squall spoke up in his defense with a   
casual shrug and uplift of his hands.   
  
"I think we've dealt with worse," Squall said, hating the way that everyone was looking at him,   
how the area had gotten so quiet. For that reason, he didn't look at anyone but the wild-haired   
blonde. "You have an -idea- of where to go, don't you Zell?"  
  
"Of course!" Zell exclaimed, shooting everyone an indignant little glare. And, before Quistis'   
eyes could make a full rotation, he was lifting his chin in order to explain. "You know the   
coast we just passed?"  
  
"Uh-huh." Irvine said.   
  
"And the coast over that way?" Zell pointed in the direction that they were going with the   
casual cock of one thumb.  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"Well, I have reason to believe that our Guardian Force is somewhere between the two."  
  
"Cute." Quistis said dully from her corner. "Very, very cute."  
  
"I was kidding!" Zell cried, throwing up his hands.  
  
"Can I hit him?" Irvine asked, ignoring Zell's last comment. "Really, now? I'm serious, here."  
  
"Oh, bring it on, John Wayne." Zell hissed, bringing up his fists and leaning over in an   
intimidating and yet almost twittery manner. He gave a little punch in the air and glared,   
almost spasming visibly as all of his muscles tightened and prepped. "I'm going to get medieval   
on your My Little Pony-tailed as--"  
  
Suddenly, the Ragnorak jerked sharply to one side. Zell's narrowed eyes flew wide and his arms   
flapped about, as his feet came off the floor and he was sent hurtling into the other side of   
the cockpit. Irvine, who had already been there, let out a little wail as Zell came barreling   
toward him due to gravity rather than anger. Quistis pressed her hands into both sides of the   
corner and Squall grabbed onto a seat--flipping sideways and onto the window behind him.  
  
And then, suddenly, the aircraft righted itself.  
  
"Sorry," Selphie said pointedly. "Grown people fighting like two-year olds seems to make me   
nervous for some crazy reason. Funny, didn't think it would affect my flyin--" She demonstrated   
another little shake. "Oops! There I go again!"  
  
There was a thump and a groan from Zell and Irvine's side of the cockpit.  
  
  
They had eventually consulted each-other in a civil manner and brought the Ragnorak to a   
landing. Zell had not been lying when he had said that he was kidding earlier, for he had a   
much more concise area in mind -- a moderate-sized island to the east of the mainland. It was   
namely forest, and thick at that. Squall found it rather uncomfortable, although he did not   
complain. Everyone else seemed to be fine, for if they shared his worry over Rinoa, they did   
not show it.  
  
...It was nothing to be concerned about, right? That's what Rinoa had said...?  
  
Quistis, who was second in line to Zell, rubbed the small of her back with a twisting wince of   
her face. "Remind me never to go to Selphie for therapy."  
  
"I -don't- like it when you guys fight," Selphie said firmly.  
  
"Gee," Irvine replied musingly. "You didn't seem to be flying any different than usual. I mean   
I'm only two-thirds bruised, now. I actually think that you're improving."  
  
Eventually the pair fell behind, as Selphie went barreling into the tall man with her fists   
beating in flaming half-seriousness. Squall, who had been playing caboose, cast them a sidelong   
glance and pushed past then with a little brush of his shoulder. He was ignored, and seemed as   
invisible as he felt.  
  
"What do you think, Quisty?" Zell asked over one shoulder.  
  
"Forward seems to be working for now," She replied tiredly, pushing a bit of hair back from her   
eyes and letting them swim from side to side with an expression that was as dull as her voice.   
She was the embodiment of a sigh.  
  
Squall thrust his hands into his pockets, heaved his shoulders, and wandered after them. The   
forest was an array of intermingling greens. He didn't despise nature or anything of the like,   
but this environment was stifling. Wrong. It just felt...  
  
"Wrong." Selphie said. She was grooming herself a little, but halfheartedly so. Irvine, who was   
tugging to re-arrange his hat as well, found himself nodding in agreement. Both were red-faced   
from sprinting to catch up with the rest of them. However, their eyes were not as clear with   
exuberance as they had been before.  
  
"Isn't it, though?" Selphie continued. "I mean, it's -creepy-."   
  
"It's not your sanitized bedroom, you mean?" Quistis said.  
  
"Maybe we're getting close," Zell said.  
  
Selphie crossed her arms over herself and shivered dramatically. "If this is what it means to   
be getting close, I don't know if I want to go any nearer!"  
  
Zell's face fell a little at her comment, and Selphie found herself struggling to make up for   
it. This was, after all, Zell's idea. He'd had worked so hard to organize this for them and had   
been so excited about it -- hell, so had she! And, despite the chill running like wet fingers   
down her spine, she put on a tense little smile.  
  
"...But wow, it's so thrilling, too!" She said cheerfully.   
  
Zell watched his feet and twiddled them a little.  
  
"We're looking for a cave, right?" Irvine asked. "That's what you said, Zell?"  
  
"Yeah," Zell said, attempting to break free of his hesitation. "That's what Xu's databas--That's   
what Xu said, anyway. Some cave on an uninhabited island east of Centra."  
  
Zell had flushed a little when he had corrected himself. No one else gave him much of a glance,   
but Squall did. That strange, sinking feeling that had plagued him earlier returned in addition   
to the discomfort that he already felt, and he tried to sate it by biting at the corner of one   
of his lips.   
  
Zell cast him a shielded glance, but didn't do much more than that. Rather, he scratched the   
side of his head and directed his attention to the rest of the group, which had gathered around   
him in a mixture of frustration and annoyance.  
  
"Selphie must be right," Quistis finally said. "I feel it too. We must be close."  
  
And sure enough, after hiking for only a quarter of an hour more they found it. It had been a  
close call, however, for this wasn't exactly how they pictured a cave. If not for the fact that   
Irvine had moved his head to slap an especially burdensome mosquito, no one ever would have   
seen it. In that shift of his head he caught a space against the green that was blacker than   
most, and upon further inspection they found a crevice so small that it would almost be a   
squeeze for Selphie.  
  
"This isn't even a cliff!" Zell said. "I mean, talk about slicing a little hole into the top of   
a cherry pie crust!"  
  
Everyone looked at him curiously.  
  
"What," Zell retorted. "I'm hungry, okay?"  
  
Selphie was voted to go first, which seemed to be the most practical thing to do. She was,   
after all, the smallest. Growing quite enthusiastic now, she readily agreed. Everyone waited   
patiently as she touched her fingertips together and murmured a little spell. With a spread of   
her hands she set a small ball of light aglow in the center of her palm.  
  
And, with her face illuminated in the dim forest light, she ducked down in order to squeeze   
through the tiny crevice. Everyone watched her and the light disappear with silent   
tension -- the sound of her cry made everyone jump at once, although the sound was not fearful   
in the least. It was an all-clear.  
  
"That's odd, actually," Quistis said musingly as she pressed her shoulder into the vertical   
hole. "I've just realized that we haven't really run into a monster yet..."  
  
And she faded into the black, leaving the comment in the air to swelter and linger.  
  
Zell went next, and was by far the hardest to squeeze. Irvine and Squall worked to help him out   
from their side, and Quistis and Selphie did their work from within the hole. Eventually, with   
an animated and relieved groan, Zell managed his way through, muttering something or another to   
himself about damn-well finding a bigger hole.  
  
"No monsters? Yeah. Right. Look at this mosquito bite, Squall." Irvine went next with not much   
more ease. The hole--which was more of a crack than anything--was just as small as it was   
narrow. Squall looked upon it warily as he advanced, and with a slow motion he set his foot in   
the bottom and his hand on the stone, before sliding his left shoulder into the cave.  
  
It was cold, colder than he thought this continent could ever get. The chill snaked through his   
leather coat like needles and into the pits of his flesh like vapor, instantly setting him into   
a clammy freeze. He had to arch his head back to get through, and his neck was struck with the   
worst of it.   
  
And the smell! It was so dry and dank. Like claws it dug deep down into his lungs, grated   
against the bottoms of them, and drew every trace of clean air away from him in a single gasp.   
And then he fell in sideways with the scrape of his spine, a one-foot drop. The floor was wet   
beneath his boots -- he knew this, because somehow he could feel it.  
  
Selphie stood with her orb of light among the rest of them. They were in a cozy little space,   
ten paces wide and eight short. The ceiling was low and just barely enough for Irvine to stand   
straight. When Squall adjusted himself Selphie quietly turned her pale and outstretched arm off   
to one side. Like an explosion the glow spread down a narrow and intestine-like corridor.   
Somehow, the brightness seemed to only enhance the dark. It was radiant where Squall stood, but   
the hole looked endless.  
  
They all exchanged glances. Squall had felt small and insignificant outside, as if he were of   
little worth and invisible to the eye... but now, here, in this crowded little hollow in the   
earth... They were a unit. They were one.  
  
"Do you feel it?" Zell whispered.  
  
"What?" Quistis replied, just as low and quiet.  
  
"...The butterflies in your stomach."   
  
Everyone in the group couldn't help it from coming -- the anxious flicker of a smile.  
  
  
Selphie had to duck in order to get through the corridor, which seemed to only get smaller and   
smaller. Zell crowded in right next to her, holding the map in both hands and shuffling in   
order to keep himself steady. However, he couldn't tell the top from the bottom, and kept   
flipping it whenever he thought that no one was looking.  
  
"Our map is eyeliner on a cafeteria napkin," Irvine said bleakly. "We're doomed."  
  
Quistis elbowed him in the side. "Anything, yet?"  
  
Zell looked from side to side. The corridor was smooth and circular, and although it seemed to   
slope and narrow a little, it didn't seem to curve that much. After a moment of considering   
this, he said, "Forward, still." As if they actually could go in any other direction.  
  
"And why on earth would you be carrying around eyeliner, anyway?" Irvine asked.   
  
"Can I see the map?" Selphie hardly had time to inquire, before Zell clutched the napkin to his   
chest in an indignant manner. His eyes flashed madly, and with a rolling of her head she let   
out a little exasperated, "Okay, okay. Keep it."  
  
Ruffling himself out a bit, Zell un-crinkled the map and eyed her before examining it again.   
Squall, who was last in line--and had the hardest time seeing, especially with the tunnel   
getting so narrow--watched this display with the wetting of his lips. He had gotten into the   
habit of bracing himself on the side of the wall, but the stone was clammy   
and...strange...feeling, even with his gloves it sickened him. Even then, he reflexively put   
his hand there, and again he drew it back into a fist to his chest in disgusted response.  
  
"What is this thing, anyway?" He asked.  
  
"It's called Zenkamuka in the records," Zell said.  
  
"...And?"  
  
"She likes classical music and long walks on the beach?" Zell tried.  
  
"No, seriously. What is it?" Quistis asked.  
  
Zell was slower to respond this time. Perhaps it was because he was still studying the map, but   
he let out a little ~nnng~ sound that suggested that he just didn't want to answer the question.   
"Um... you ever find little slugs stuck to the outside of your window...?"  
  
Quistis groaned. "This just gets better and better."  
  
"What? It doesn't make this thing any less spooky, guys!"  
  
That was true, actually. Everyone--even Quistis--could feel their bellies knotting tighter and   
tighter with fear. That sensation that had been plaguing them in the forest had gotten stronger,   
and when Irvine tried to laugh off Zell's comment he found himself choking a little. Squall's   
hand rest reassuringly on his shoulder from behind for a moment, although neither man felt   
comforted. They knew fear, but this was something altogether different. The sensation was so   
strange that their bodies had difficult times reacting to it. Squall was in a state where he   
didn't quite know -how- he felt, or how he should feel. And those nervous twitters remained.  
  
Just when they thought that they had to go on their hands and knees, the tunnel opened up   
again. Zell threw up a finger and exclaimed, "I'll check the map!" Much to everyone's groans   
and sighs. Zell, however, purposefully ignored their laments and consulted the eyeliner. He   
wished that he had chosen a darker color, but didn't say anything about that lest he draw   
attention to the poorly-drawn map again.  
  
After a thoughtful ~hmm~, he declared, "We're still in the cave."  
  
Irvine gave him a playful little thumbs-up when he turned around to grin at them all. Despite   
the fact that Quistis sighed and Squall was unresponsive, they all felt the mood lighten   
considerably at the comment, nevermind the fact that their flesh still felt as if it had been   
peeled away from a corpse, that they were in an air-locked and shallow crypt.  
  
Zell turned his face ahead again and started to move. However, with a sudden gasp he came to a   
halt and spread his arms out in order to catch Selphie with an elbow. His map, which had been   
dropped in the motion, fluttered down onto the stony ground and tossed lightly like a feather   
down the slight incline. It was sucked into the darkness.  
  
"What did you see?" Selphie whispered.   
  
"Hold out your arm again," Zell hissed.  
  
Squall, who crowded in from behind, couldn't see anything from behind the silhouettes of the   
rest of them. Growing inwardly frustrated, he stood on his toes and jabbed the top of his skull   
into the ceiling of the tunnel. Rubbing at the ache, he lowered flat on his feet and managed to   
find a window between Irvine's shoulder and Quistis' arched neck.  
  
Selphie, after casting Zell a curious glance, lifted her arm and stretched the light out as far   
as it could go. Zell dropped his arm in order to allow her to take a step forward, and with an   
increasing feeling of dread the girl saw the shadows shift and snake away from the light--never   
fading, but simply running a few steps back, taunting them. There were two posts at the far end   
of the tunnel, wound with rope... although this is not what Selphie saw, or at least not what   
she remembered.  
  
There, just at the edge of what her light allowed, was the play of two white cheekbones. Human   
cheekbones, stretched beneath the flesh of human cheeks. And then there was a heavy, sloshing   
rush as the blood flowed out from her head and into her feet. Everything tingled, every   
muscle... as if they had all began to doze at once.  
  
Squall narrowed his eyes. Two posts. It was a bridge of some sort. Someone had built a bridge   
here... This must have been where they were to find it. This is where the Guardian Force   
Zenkamuka was held... Somewhere across that bridge. Finally, they were nearing something other   
than the tunnel itself.  
  
And then suddenly everything shattered. Selphie went barreling back into Zell, who sent everyone   
behind him askew. Squall felt himself flailing backwards. The wall, which he had been scorning   
bitterly for the whole trip, did nothing to help him. His arm, elbow, and hip slid against it   
until he thumped onto the floor with a crack. Irvine's bottom smashed down onto his left knee,   
and Squall's face contorted with the pain.  
  
It was then when he heard it -- Selphie. She was stammering.  
  
With a flash of her eyes her mind apparently had snapped into a million different pieces. Her   
chest heaved and fell and her gaze was bugged and glazed in the nature of a confined animal.   
Zell tried to keep her on her feet, but she kept spiraling backwards, her skinny arms flailing   
wildly. From within her rattling breaths came the ghosts of wails, and within those wails there   
were words. Squall could not make out a single one of them, but he didn't need to. What she   
tried to express was impossible to put into any language.  
  
Zell had managed to get his arms looped beneath her own; he hooked her and held her tight.   
Selphie, having thoroughly gone mad at this point, thrashed with almost inhuman strength beneath   
his hold, beating her back against his chest and breaking into a shriek. The sound was   
high-pitched and loud enough to split Squall's ear-drums, and through the flickering   
darkness--Selphie was waving the light around--he saw both Irvine and Quistis hunch over and   
cover their ears. The whole cave echoed with the sound, and Selphie kept feeding it with her   
screams.  
  
And then, suddenly, it was all too much for Zell. She broke free and fell backwards with a crash.   
Squall saw her then, as she scurried back and out of both Quistis and Irvine's reach. As she   
passed him he saw her face, the way that her flesh had gone two shades paler and her eyes had   
gone almost eerily wide, so that her irises were covered by white on all sides. Although the   
caves still vibrated, he realized that she had gone silent.  
  
Selphie had stopped breathing, and was too afraid to realize it. She had gashed her knee on a   
rock when she fell, Squall saw, and blood ran down one leg in a web-work of black. It smelled   
strong, and that metallic scent joined the dank odor of the crypt. Hastily Squall overcame   
himself enough to get a hold of her, and before Selphie could react Irvine had leaped as well.   
They managed to pin her down on both sides.  
  
Her legs kicked wildly and her head cracked flat against the floor. Squall watched her chest   
rise, tighten... and then she let out a bone-shattering scream that nearly turned Irvine's hair   
white -- he tensed and closed his eyes, and then exchanged a look with Squall that displayed   
both terror, pain, and bewilderment.  
  
Quistis managed to finally join them, and she caught Selphie's legs. Thus properly pinned, the   
girl thrashed her hips and continued to screech and sob at the top of her lungs. Her eyes,   
Squall realized with a pang, were still wide and fixated... On what, he did not know.  
  
Zell took a step backwards and put a fist to his mouth. He whispered against his flesh and felt   
the glow erupt from the center of his palm. Staring at the scene in front of him for a moment   
longer, he finally brought himself around to face the bridge again. Extending his hand as if in   
attempt to ward off evil spirits, he set the first half of the bridge aglow.  
  
There was nothing there.  
  
...At least, not that he could see.  
  
  
  
  
End Part 5/?  
To be Continued.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	7. Part Six

The world is changing  
But my love will remain  
Do you see beauty?  
Do you see love?  
Do you see anything at all?  
--James Iha  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part VI  
  
  
After Ultimicia's defeat came to pass and became nothing more than a bad memory Esthar fully   
opened its gates to the world. This was President Loire's doing, now that Ellone was safe and   
the times had grown peaceful beyond the fresh lingering of the past. A monster had to be flushed   
out of hiding every now and then, they had grown wary of humans as their kind was killed off in   
large numbers around them. Even now, a disturbance in the city was a rare occurrence.  
  
However, what no one knew was that this choice was to be the start of a dire mistake, something   
that would tumble with time and become more and more treacherous. Yes, at first Loire's council   
objected, the citizens of Esthar grew tense -- but their worries were not for the right reason,   
they were all fed by the fear of breaking tradition rather than foreshadowing, and after a few   
months of being open to a new world they soon forgot their concerns and absorbed the outsiders   
and their world like a fine delicacy  
  
Rinoa had been moving all day, and yet had hardly moved her feet. When she stepped out of the   
newly erected Esthar train station her knees were weak and wobbly and her calves tingled with   
sleep. The world was a rushing whirlwind that had forgotten about her, and as pilgrims bustled   
by her down the white marble steps she found herself unable to move any further, amazed at the   
number of people there.  
  
Beyond the gates of the station Esthar stretched out in its glory. It didn't seem real, it had   
never seemed real to her when she looked over on it. If not for the little zips of transports   
moving here and their in tiny blazes of light, if not for the specks of people on the roadways   
like ants, if this had been her first time here... She wouldn't have believed that the image   
was real. But it was. The south side of the city seemed a little more tattered, the war having   
taken its toll -- but this never changed the majesty.  
  
Overhead, the speakers belted out a second call for the train back to Fisherman's horizon.   
Rinoa was beginning to get flustered now, with people moving -toward- her, like a back flowing   
river on all sides. And, unable to breathe any longer, she bent to pick up her solitary duffel   
bag--the one that she was supposed to be using in Centra today--and walked with clapping steps   
away from the platform among the rest of the people traveling into the city.  
  
Esthar had changed. Or perhaps it was just the way that she looked at it.  
  
No one gave her a glance. It was so strange, feeling this insignificant. After all that she'd   
done, how she had played a major part in bringing the Lunar Cry, her part in attempting to   
bring and end to the world and then her part in saving it.... It was odd, how no one even looked   
her way twice or seemed to know her face.  
  
She was relieved, but tense. Even though it never happened, she still expected someone to pop   
out and jab an accusing finger at her, pointing her out to be sorceress that had released Adel.   
Rinoa always felt this way when she was in public. This was a curse that there was no cure for.  
  
Rinoa's hair tickled at her collarbone as she adjusted her jacket more tightly around herself   
and looked down at her feet. The floors were made of glass, and below her was a technician   
working with clear wires that ran along the bottom of the path. He looked up at her like a   
reflection in a lake and cast a crooked smile, waved with the narrow tool in his hand. Rinoa   
smiled wanly back and shuffled on. The wind was strong here, in the open street, and with her   
hands in her pockets she lowered her head against it and resisted the urge to let herself be   
blown sideways.  
  
"Rinoa?"  
  
Squall had been so... Angry wasn't the right word, although it was the closest one that she   
could think of. He seemed so hurt, so lost, so disappointed in her. And although this was not   
out of his character, Rinoa knew, she felt that he could have been empathetic enough to actually  
-support- her a little. She had been nervous about coming here in the first place, she didn't   
need -him- weighing on her mind, too.  
  
"Damn it," Rinoa muttered.   
  
"Miss Heartilly?"  
  
The voice first registered, it was that of a young man. Rinoa lifted her head and put her hand   
up to her face in attempt to keep her flipping tresses at bay. Squinting against the wind -- the   
sky looked bad, a grey that seemed to make the city seem more metallic and sharp--she caught   
sight of a soldier with his helmet tucked under his arm. He had spiked, cropped hair and a lean   
face that lit up in bashful brightness at her recognition, and with casual, quick steps he made   
his way through the crowd with the ease of a man who could part water with his will. His free   
hand lifted in a two-fingered wave.  
  
"Here, Miss Heartilly, I'm right here."  
  
He came to a halt beside her, standing strategically so that his back blocked the wind from her   
frame. Rinoa dropped her hand in a trail behind one ear and gazed up at him more openly then. He   
had sharp green eyes and a clean, streamlined arrangement of features, and he continued to smile   
in a sheepishly humored way. Scratching at the side of his head he winced against the wind in   
order to turn and jab a thumb in the direction of the train station that Rinoa had just left.  
  
"Sorry! I was supposed to meet you when you came off!" He had to raise his voice above the   
bustle of the crowd and the rising wind. It was early afternoon, and already it was growing   
dark. "I kind of got distracted, I'm still learning my way around. You -are- Miss Heartilly,   
right? I haven't just jumped the wrong woman?"  
  
Rinoa nodded and started to reply, but he was already talking at her again. "Great. I'm really   
sorry, again. I'm Ikuya. I'm your escort to the palace... Although I really wouldn't call it a   
-palace- really, I mean, this isn't a time of kings, right? Right? Let's go, though -- We   
shouldn't waste time, lest we get blown away. The weather isn't too hot, I'm sure you can see   
that for yourself. What a welcome, huh?"  
  
What a welcome, indeed. Suddenly Ikuya's hand was pressed into the small of her back, and with   
a little push he was ushering her forward without skipping a beat in his words. And talking --   
he never stopped! At first Rinoa was annoyed, especially on account that his hand was always on   
her in one place or another.  
  
However, she soon grew to appreciate it. Ikuya worked his magic and the crowd became less   
intimidating, they all seemed to move out of their way and kept the path clear at Ikuya's   
polite shoves. Furthermore, his voice seemed to put her at ease, and the chatter washed some of  
her burdens and tension away.   
  
"It's real nice, having the gates opened. I mean, things have become so diverse here now, you   
know? People who have never set foot out of Esthar are finally going out to see the world -- all  
the trees and grass, the ocean! And people like me can come in and make a living, here." Ikuya   
said with great animation, looking over at her every once in a while as if in attempt to keep   
her involved in the one-way conversation. "I used to be a soldier in Deling City--"  
  
"I was born in Deling!" Rinoa said delightedly.  
  
Ikuya beamed. "It's a small world, isn't it?" He gave her shoulder a tap and pointed off to   
their right. "That's our new communication tower. It's how President Loire contacted you at   
Balamb yesterday. We can't do very long transmissions, but we're getting there -- you may even   
be able to contact home if you want." He nodded with a bob of his head and suddenly had his   
hand in the small of her back again, steering her with a press of his fingers to a sharp   
turn -- veering off the street and toward a transport. Rinoa looked at the tower from over one   
shoulder, but didn't have much time before Ikuya was talking again. "Yes, we're getting in   
touch with the world, now. It's a great change. Watch your head."  
  
Rinoa turned around just in time to avoid a line of crackling wires that was stretched across   
the seats of a circular transport. Her eyes widened and remained fixated on them, even as she   
ducked beneath and stood on the other side. Another technician waved at her and put his gloved   
hands into the mess again.  
  
"Have a seat. I wouldn't advise that you stand, these things move kind of fast."  
  
"But--" Rinoa slid her eyes pointedly toward the exposed wires.  
  
"What? Oh, that? Something got into it, no big deal. We had a little pest problem this morning,   
nothing to fret about, though. We've almost got the place cleaned up, really -- I mean, there   
are a lot of corners to sweep, you know? They're hard to check. But we're getting there." He   
waved his elegant fingers around at the technician a little. "Connect us to the Palace, could   
you?" And with hardly a skip in tempo he was talking to Rinoa again, who tentatively sat down at   
his side with her knees pressed together. "This tunnel is pretty clear now, that monster was   
just a fluke. They're all pretty afraid of us now, so they never go out in the open. Besides,   
these transports do a number on them when they hide in the pipes."  
  
Rinoa, however, kept her eyes on the technician. He was holding a wire in each hand, and with a   
wary little motion he tapped them together. Sparks flew, and the shield flashed on and off.   
Eyeing it and nodding, the man connected the wires and set it up with a mild glow and a hum.   
Rinoa suddenly felt trapped and claustrophobic. At her side Ikuya rattled on with one leg   
casually crossed over another, as calm and smooth as could be.  
  
The technician dug through the wires and finally brought up another two again. Rinoa watched him   
warily put them together and felt the snap of the engine starting, and her hands gripped the   
edge of the seat as the disk-like transport lifted a few feet in the air and swayed like a boat   
on rocking waves. The blackening sky had a nice side effect, and a crack of thunder and bolt of  
lightning snapped across the distant sky with perfect timing. Rinoa's eyes crinkled with worry.  
  
And then they were moving, with Ikuya talking and the technician waving at them in merry   
farewell.  
  
  
Just as Ellone moved to touch her fingertips to the conference room doorway it pulled back and   
away from her grip. She stepped back, startled, and a stony-faced man pushed past her with a   
shove of his shoulder, despite the fact that there was plenty of room for him to move around   
her. Whirring to face him, she narrowed her brown eyes and took a step back so that her shoulder   
stopped the door from closing, and with backward steps she moved into the room, blankly watching   
him storm off in a whirl of disgust and fury.  
  
Before the doors swung shut she was turning and looking over one shoulder, elegantly moving her   
body to match her face. With that her eyes came upon Laguna Loire, President of Esthar... her   
Uncle Laguna. With a graceful parting of her lips--she was so beautiful, Laguna thought--she   
threw him a concerned and questioning glance. Was that, lying beneath.... was she scolding him,   
too?  
  
Laguna was getting old. He was still healthily lean, yes, but it was bordering gaunt. His face   
was lined and his brown hair faded where it was not already grey. When he smiled--or frowned,   
or glared, or looked serious--his eyes puckered a little. They were still very clear, though,   
and his motions retained the ease that he had in his youth... Sometimes.  
  
He put one hand on his hip and the other on his forehead. "I don't get it," He said. "I just   
don't get it, Elle." His arms dropped and his shoulders heaved a little, tiredly. Ellone   
realized it then -- he'd been looking tired a lot as of late. She hadn't really thought about   
it until then, but now she was worried.  
  
"Were you rude to him, Uncle Laguna?" She asked as she crossed the room. The words themselves   
were far from loving, but her tone and motions were. Carefully, she set her hands on his   
shoulders and tipped her head at him, gazing into his eyes in that lovely way of hers, so   
concerned.  
  
"Feh. He deserved it." Laguna spat out his response.  
  
Ellone pursed her lips. "What did he want?"   
  
The fire in his eyes shifted, and Laguna looked away. Ellone moved her head to meet his gaze   
again, but Laguna had turned by then, breaking contact in order to limp across the room. Ellone   
felt her stomach drop. "Laguna? What was it? What did he say?"  
  
"...Nothing."  
  
"Liar."  
  
"...It's nothing, Elle."  
  
"Say that again without letting your leg shake." She replied with a little upward tilt of her   
eyebrow. Her arms were moving to cross over her chest when the building jolted with an   
especially large crash of thunder, and with huge eyes she looked up at the ceiling. Outside,   
the sky split and rain came pouring down, falling like bullets onto the roof of the palace.   
Swallowing, she blinked and set her gaze upon Laguna again, before re-adjusting her resolve and   
lifting her chin a little again.  
  
Usually, that pointed stare worked. However, it was not successful then. Laguna simply muttered   
a response and fluttered his hand about at her, as if he were ushering her away. "It's just   
business, Elle. I know how you hate business-talk."  
  
"If it's nothing important, why won't you tell me?"  
  
"Rinoa Heartilly is coming today." He said, smoothly changing the subject. Dragging his leg a   
little, he put his back to the widow and rested there. Ellone, unfazed, watched him with a   
stubborn pursing of her lips. Laguna was equally bull-headed, though, and he met her eyes in a   
silent battle. Ellone was the first to sigh and roll her head a little, relenting... Laguna   
punctuated his victory by going on.  
  
"If she comes in wet, I'm going to skewer Ikuya." He said bitterly.  
  
"Come, now." Ellone replied. However, both of them knew that he wasn't in the least bit   
serious, although Laguna's eyes did move warily toward the window, which was being barraged by   
the rain. It was as dark as pitch outside now, despite the fact that evening had not yet come.  
  
"Is Squall here? I didn't know that they were coming for a visit."  
  
Laguna shrugged at her first question, and then shook his head at her second. "I contacted   
Rinoa last night -- we have some....personal business that I'd like to attend to."  
  
Ellone narrowed her eyes at him curiously. "Personal business? Like what?"  
  
"Later. I don't think we'll have time to go over it right now." Laguna said guiltily. He had   
been keeping a lot of things from Ellone lately, and was tired of putting things off and making   
excuses. Holding back always had its drawbacks and consequences, and Laguna felt that he was   
getting too old to lapse into secrecy... Even over the most trivial of matters.  
  
"Does Rinoa know what's going on?" She asked.  
  
Laguna shook his head.  
  
That was just like him, making things more dramatic then they should have been. Ellone's lips   
had parted, as she was going to say just that, but she never got a chance to do so. The door   
clicked behind her and she turned to see Rinoa and her escort come dripping into the room. When   
she turned back to Laguna, his eyes were looking past her and to the dark-haired woman instead.   
  
Rinoa smiled wanly at them, although she felt some degree of tension. Warily she wet her lips   
and wrung out her hair a little. Ikuya had his coat off and was the wetter of the two --   
obviously, he had taken off his over garment in attempt to shield Rinoa from the rain. He   
smiled in that sheepish, humored way of his, and Laguna found, upon seeing that smile, that he   
liked this man greatly.   
  
Ellone, having recovered from the sudden entrance, crossed the room and shared an embrace with   
Rinoa for a moment. Ending it with a peck on the cheek, she held the young woman back at a   
distance and said, "It's been too long!" As if she hadn't a worry on her mind. Rinoa, however,   
was very poor at hiding what she thought -- her eyes went to Laguna despite herself. Did she   
look a little apprehensive? Ellone didn't doubt it.  
  
"I suppose you've been on the road all day," She said. "You probably want to talk with Uncle   
Laguna now... We can catch up on things tonight." Rinoa nodded a response and said something of   
similar scope. Laguna had limped over by then, and after exchanging another hug with the damp   
girl Ellone lifted on her toes and gave him a peck on the cheek in farewell.  
  
"Don't -I- get a kiss or something?" Ikuya asked innocently. Ellone wrinkled her nose at him   
and put her hand on the door. With a little wave to Rinoa, she stepped out of the room. Ikuya,   
after receiving a nod from Laguna, went out before the door even swung to a dull and silent   
close. "Hey, wait up -- have you seen the rain yet? Wow, huh!"  
  
His pleasantly chattering voice echoed down the hallway in his departure.  
  
Laguna's eyebrows danced a little as he looked at the closed door. When he turned back to Rinoa   
there was a smile on his face, and with an apologetic look in his eyes he put his hand on her   
back and steered her toward a seat.   
  
"I'm sorry to bring you here like this, with no explanation -- we're still working at our   
communication system, and what I wanted to talk to you about would have taken too long to do   
over a transmission. I hope you understand."  
  
Rinoa -didn't- understand, but still she nodded and bit at her lower lip. The room had a long   
conference table--that's what it was used for, namely, and he settled her in a corner seat   
before moving toward a desk that was on the other side of the room. His limp was getting worse,   
although his face was rather calm.   
  
Laguna bent and pulled open a bottom drawer. He rummaged for the shortest of moments, and with   
a scrape he pulled a flat, rectangular box out and into his hands. It was about the length of   
Rinoa's forearm. Curiously, she watched him take a chair across from her and set the simple   
container down in front of him.  
  
It was a strange combination... cozy, in the dim lamplight, and yet the large room made her   
feel tiny and insecure. Eventually, Rinoa settled on Laguna. Focusing on him alone made the   
room feel smaller than it was. Tightening her lips, and then releasing them, she motioned   
toward the box with the barest tilt of her chin.   
  
"What is this?"  
  
Laguna didn't say a word, not yet... Rinoa met his eyes and tried to read them--a mixture of   
sadness, joy, and pride--and she watched him lower his gaze to his hands. And, in the manner of   
a reply, he simply put them onto the corners of the parcel and pushed it toward her with a   
scuffle, until it was directly in front of her.   
  
"Open it."  
  
  
  
  
End Part 6/?  
To be Continued.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	8. Part Seven

"Get up  
Put the body in motion  
Get up, get up  
Put the body in motion  
Don't stop--  
Just start the commotion."  
--Wiseguys  
  
  
"For When you Return"  
Part VII  
  
  
For the life of them all, Selphie Tilmitt would not stop screaming.  
  
Squall was building up a sweat from holding her, and wondered how she was managing to hold out   
this long. Selphie had indeed gone mad, and Squall wouldn't have been surprised if she thrashed   
and cried herself to death. He thought all of this methodically, not because he didn't care, but  
because this was how he always thought during dire situations. Irvine's face, on the other hand,  
had a liquidy sheen to it and he looked positively stricken.  
  
"She's crazy," He kept saying. "She's gone mad."  
  
"Selphie," Squall said to her, trying to keep his face reassuringly close. "Selphie, it's   
okay -- everything is fine, every--" Selphie had broken out of Irvine's hold and her opposite   
shoulder snapped into his face, thus painfully silencing him. Squall managed to retain his grip   
and Irvine let out a yelp that sounded like a sob while managing to grab her again. Selphie,   
wild-eyed, continued to shriek in unabashed terror.  
  
Quistis snapped something over her shoulder at Zell, although the man couldn't hear what she   
said over the noise. This small cavern caught the cries and held them quite nicely... Zell's   
ears were ringing at the sound. He couldn't hear himself think -- not that he took the time to   
do so that often.  
  
Nevertheless, he saw the panic in Quistis' eyes and felt a sudden snag of a rare idea. Lifting   
his hands, he said, "Sleep!" And from his already glowing palms came the tiniest sprinkle of   
light... Selphie did not do as he commanded, but something in her shifted a little, and it   
seemed that she suddenly thrashed a little less for a brief instant.  
  
Fed by this observation, Zell put his back to the screams and placed his fingers against his   
temples, as if in deep thought or concentration. Some of the abilities that came with   
junctioning were reflexive, while others had to be controlled. Zell had to mentally force   
himself to strengthen his sleep spells.  
  
He turned, shouted out the command again, and thrust his downward palm in Selphie's direction,   
concentrating on her with a narrowing of his eyes. This time the radiant dust caught, digging   
into her nostrils and jerking her head down with a ~thunk~. Her eyes flew wide for a moment and   
her chest heaved in a final attempt to thrust out a cry, and then with a rattling hiss of breath   
she lost consciousness.  
  
Squall and Irvine looked down at her as if they couldn't believe their eyes, faces dripping.   
Warily, shaking, Squall released his hold--his hands hurt!--and pushed himself up to his feet.   
The cave still vibrated in the manner of a rapid heartbeat. Trembling, he pushed his hair back   
from eyes and saw that Quistis had risen as well. Irvine was still on his knees next to Selphie,   
looking lost and shocked, holding his own hands.  
  
"What the hell..." Zell whispered. His ears hurt so much, he didn't want to add to the noise   
any more than he had to.  
  
"This isn't very fun anymore," Irvine murmured.  
  
Squall ran his hand down his face and exchanged a look with Quistis. The blonde woman was biting   
worriedly at her top lip, and when she released it there was a dry stoic quality to her voice   
that told them all, quite frankly, that she was just as frightened as the rest of them.   
"Something did that -- it wasn't just Selphie."  
  
"Slugs aren't -that- ugly," Zell said jokingly. Irvine shot him a glare, and Zell instantly   
looked at his feet, his pathetic attempt to try at humor instantly slaughtered.  
  
"I say that we go on," Quistis said. Everyone looked at her with a mixture between anger and   
dread. However, she took that opportunity to explain herself. "Didn't you guys hear me?   
Something -did- this. It was an attack, just like fire or ice. I can't think of what else it   
could be."  
  
"Do you think she'll be better when we wake her up?" Irvine asked, oblivious to what Quistis   
had just said. He was still sitting at Selphie's side, and looked paler than the fallen girl   
did, almost. Quistis closed her mouth and looked over at him, unable to snap a reply... Not at   
that forlorn face.  
  
"I agree with Quistis," Zell finally said, looking humble so to not offend anyone. "We should   
just look a little further. It'd be a good idea to scout out the bridge, at least."  
  
Quistis and Irvine looked at him, and then as a unit they all turned to Squall. At this, Squall   
resisted a sigh -- why did it always have to come back to him? All he wanted to do was go home,   
to get back to Rinoa. However, he found himself saying something entirely different than what   
his mind told him. "Whatever is there, it's dangerous. I don't think we should just leave it   
for someone else to find."  
  
How was he to know that these words would be the spawn of a dire tragedy?  
  
  
  
Irvine had been right. The fun and excitement was gone. This became a chore, a dreadful task   
that no one, not even Zell, wanted to go through with. Their anxiety went from pleasant to   
gut-wrenching under the turn of events, and no matter how hard they tried to push the feelings   
out of their minds and bodies it still remained.  
  
One thing was for certain -- Squall had realized that Rinoa was the lucky one.  
  
Irvine was the one who ended up carrying Selphie, hoisting her on his shoulders as if she were a   
backpack. She was breathing comfortably, in a sleep too heavy and thick for dreams -- which was   
a good thing, for her pale face made it clear that if she had dreamed, they would be nightmares.  
  
Squall was leading now, with Zell at his back and Irvine in the middle. Quistis acted as a   
cover from behind. The distance to the bridge was short, and Squall set his gloved hand upon a   
post warily as he touched the wooden slats with his foot and then looked up. Having set up a   
lantern-spell of his own, he lifted his arm to let the light reach across the bridge. With his   
free hand he warily shielded his eyes, and as the light licked across the darkness he felt that   
inner twittering escalate. Never had he felt this much fear before, and now he knew why -- a   
spell of some sort. That had to have been it.  
  
The bridge, however, was empty. Beneath it was a gash in the earth that stretched endlessly   
from side to side and was void black, no matter how far the light reached. Fatal. The fear was   
waning on his confidence painfully, and Squall was beginning to doubt himself. Perhaps they   
-should- just leave...  
  
But before he could make up his mind, he set his feet upon the bridge. It creaked, but held.   
Holding one hand behind him in silent signal for the rest to stay back, he crept forward with   
his light extended. Eyes burning and heart pounding, he carried the feeling that a ten-year-old   
did when alone in a haunted wood. His insides jumped every time he heard a noise, even if it   
was just the bridge. And the way that the light jumped... every crevice, every nook in the stony  
wall seemed to come alive.  
  
A wall was just what he came to. When his feet finally set upon solid ground he found that he   
was about eleven paces away from what looked like a dead end. He didn't take much time to look,   
however... for he turned the light and thus his attention to everyone else on the bridge.   
  
Irvine and Selphie came next. Zell had light on one side and Squall extended his own on the   
other, although Irvine almost wished that it wasn't there. The bridge looked old--why did they   
always have to be so rickety?!--and the gap endless. This was not a pleasant sight to amble   
ever-so-slowly across.  
  
"...Next time I see someone try to build a wooden bridge, I'm pushing him right into the   
river," Irvine huffed breathlessly as he finally reached solid ground. Zell was on the bridge   
at the moment that Irvine left and Quistis was at his heels. Squall visibly winced at the sound  
that the bridge made, but it hardly swayed and held.  
  
Zell got off the bridge and immediately began to jostle about, as if he were discarding an army   
of insects. "I can't believe I just -did- that?!" He cried, and everyone shot him a look as his   
voice burst and echoed through the air. Zell's face fell and his arms followed.  
  
"Sorry." He whispered.  
  
Irvine shifted Selphie around on his back and nervously shrugged his shoulders to ease the   
tension out of them. No such luck. He was coiled up like a spring. Selphie's head fell off to   
another side. Squall watched her, and musingly realized that she was the calmest of them all at   
this point.   
  
Quistis was holding her hands together, they looked cold and tight. Her blue eyes shifted from   
side to side in an open stare, and yet she seemed afraid to be looking at anything at all. It   
was odd, seeing that even she was threatening to loose her composure.  
  
Squall was the first to actually start moving, although he didn't want to. The light was   
restricted -- he could see the opposite wall and faint outlines of a curve on the other side,  
but everything in the opposite direction was pitch. However, between him and the far wall he   
spied a large stone--perhaps waist-height, and with an unspoken gesture to the rest he   
approached it, everyone clustered alongside.  
  
He ran his hand over it in a measured sweep, and the entire cave hummed with a crest of sound.   
Quistis, who had fallen alongside him, actually threw on the beginnings of a smile, albeit   
twisted with her tension. "A draw point."  
  
"Empty." Squall said. "I suppose we'll have to fill it up?" And, having gotten an idea, he held   
the gleaming orb that hovered upon his palm over the source. A purple-tinted glow swam up from   
the stone and latched onto it with smoky tendrils, taking it in. The mild absorbing quality of   
the draw point thus stole the light from him. Only someone with a powerful draw spell would have  
been able to retrieve it -- but Squall did not want to draw, not this time.  
  
And, in that manner, he filled the magical whirlwind until the shadows whispered away into the   
stone walls that were around them -- trapped on every side but one. It seemed, oddly, that they   
were in a small shelf that had been gouged out with time. The walls made a clean, angular curve   
that left them no corners... and, of course, on the other side was the sheer drop of the   
crevice and the bridge that they had crossed.  
  
Squall looked down at the draw point and was quite pleased with himself, despite the   
circumstances. However, no one said a word to him about it -- in fact, no one said a word at   
all. Squall narrowed his eyes and looked up from the light to Quistis, and saw that her eyes   
were fixated onto a point beyond him.   
  
His innards liquefied and sloshed into his kneecaps at the expression on her face, and it was a   
battle of wills to keep his face pointing toward her. Squall's neck muscles twitched as he   
reflexively started to turn in the direction that she was looking, as if he were fighting to   
stop himself from doing so. However, his instincts wore out, and like a grossly manipulated   
puppet he turned his head around and looked over one shoulder, horrified before he even saw   
anything:  
  
And at first, he -didn't- see anything. It took a while to let his eyes adjust, and his terror   
still put up a good fight, temporarily making his vision swim. But then, finally he saw it --   
and realized that it had been there all along. At first, he thought that he was looking at a   
pillar, and as his eyes cleared he realized that it was a statue, and finally...  
  
It was a person. Human. The fact that he didn't look upon a monster made this scene all the   
-more- horrible -- because Squall knew, deep in the pit of his trembling belly he knew that this  
was the source of what he was feeling. A monster was understandable; he would have shrugged at   
a freak of nature... But this?  
  
-It- was a -she-, Squall saw this right away. But she was facing away from them at this point,   
simply standing near one of the walls with her hands clasped in front of her and her head   
lowered slightly. There was not a sign of strength about her; she was of Quistis's height and   
build with slender, bony shoulders and white flesh that seemed dull and dead in the light. Her   
hair ran down to the middle of her back, it was blue-black and had a sheen that was almost   
liquefied, like dank water.  
  
She radiated a chill that almost transfixed Squall into place. He was like stone, and yet   
everything inside of him swam dizzily. Next to him, Quistis was starting to breath again,   
horrid, rattling little hisses that stung in Squall's ears.  
  
And then she started to move. This was signaled by the shift of her bones beneath the flesh of   
her shoulder-blades and arms, the way that her watery hair spilled off to one side and there   
came the first glimpse of a sharp, white nose. At this sight everything suddenly erupted, for   
Squall felt his fear escalate into mind-numbing terror--finally, he began to understand just   
what Selphie had gone through--and Quistis let out a shriek.  
  
At first he thought that she had lost her mind, too. But then he realized that inside of her   
cry were actual words, and those words were, "Don't look!" At first Squall did not understand,   
but when the group erupted into movement, his body followed. Everything seemed slow and   
sluggish, and somehow he knew that something terrible was happening. For the first time, he had   
not an inkling of control.  
  
From the corner of his eye he saw Irvine throw himself to the ground with the rock between him   
and the woman. From the sound of it, this must have been a painful fall, especially with   
Selphie on top of him. He heard her let out a little squeak, and thus realized that her   
peaceful slumber was drawing to an end.  
  
Squall never found out what Quistis or Zell did, for he quickly threw his arm over his eyes and   
shrank into the leather of his coat with a twist of his torso, squeezing his eyes shut. He felt  
a definite wave of energy, a chill that froze his spine into ice and shattered it, and realized   
that this creature had just looked at him.  
  
"What the hell are you doing?! Quistis, I can't see!" Zell had let out a shout, and Squall   
looked out from his arm just in time to see the blonde woman's pale hands swim out toward him   
in a spell. His arm dropped in shock as a light flickered into his irises and stung at him   
painfully. Letting out a cry, he put his hands over his eyes and tried to rub it out -- and   
when he pulled his hands away, he found that he couldn't see them.  
  
Bewildered, he tried to open his eyes -- and realized that they were already open.  
  
"Quistis, I can't see anything!" That was, of course the point.   
  
Meanwhile, Irvine had gotten Selphie off his back and got her lying down with the rock between   
most of her body and the creature that was somewhere else in the cave. He glanced around from   
side to side warily, heard Quistis' shouts, and pulled his rifle out from the holster at his   
back. Prepping himself in a low crouch now, he cocked the weapon and rose, flipping off his hat   
and putting it over his face with his free hand.  
  
Aiming in the direction that the creature had been in with the stretch of one arm, Irvine   
fired. There was a ~ping~ as the bullet hit rock, and the a shrill scream that unbelievably   
had come from Squall -- the side of the barrel had came to rest right over his left shoulder,   
and the gun went off right next to the bottom of his chin.  
  
Clutching the wound, Squall didn't hear Irvine blanch through the ringing of his ears. The   
trench-coat garbed man lowered his hat enough to catch sight of a few burns on his friend's   
face, and despite himself he glanced in the direction that he had shot. There was a charred   
chip in the wall -- and a flash as something black and white came hurtling toward Quistis, who   
was obviously unable to see anything.  
  
"Squall, two o'clock!" Irvine cried. But it was then when the moving form took shape, one arm   
in front and the other outstretched. Her fingers were inhumanly long and tipped in something   
that looked unpleasantly sharp -- obviously a weapon. However, when he caught a glimpse of her   
profile he found himself caught in the limbo between fear and unabashed terror. He was unable   
to move his feet.  
  
Squall meanwhile, acted without thinking. Blind and disorientated by the gunshot, it was luck   
that allowed him to get a hold of the hilt of his gunblade and draw it. Mentally throwing   
together an image of what was there when he was first able to see, Squall set his teeth in a   
fury-laced grimace and brought the blade around in an upward swing. He actually felt something,   
a pressure that swam around his weapon for a second, and then nothing. The sensation rose like   
a mist and whispered in his ears--  
  
"...Not far enough..."  
  
And then it was gone.  
  
"You missed!" Another, more material voice cried. Squall felt his heart burst at the sound of   
it -- Selphie. He whirred around to look in her direction, although it was just as dark as it   
had always been, and he turned in a little circle in bewilderment. There was too much   
commotion, too much noise going on in his head.  
  
The next sound was less pleasant. There was a dry, dull ~thunk~ and a cry, as the creature   
connected with Quistis and she was sent hurtling to the ground. Squall's nostrils were   
immediately filled with the smell of blood, and he gripped his gunblade more tightly, at a   
sudden loss.  
  
"Quistis?!" He called out. Zell had done the same, in unison.  
  
Selphie had risen and gotten her arms around Irvine with a dragging heave. It had been narrow,   
for the creature had put her eyes upon him just an instant afterwards. However, Selphie could   
not avoid it -- they met gazes for a moment, Selphie's green to the woman's abyss-like black...   
And although her terror ripened, she found that there was no great effect. Somehow, she was   
able to meet the creature's face.  
  
They exchanged a glance for a moment, the woman straddling Quistis and Selphie holding Irvine   
down on his knees with her arms wound about the front of his face. Both pairs of eyes widened   
for a moment, time seemed to have stopped, and then Quistis was lashing out with her fists, the   
creature was stiffening it's oddly human-like claws--fingers tipped with bony knobs of sharp   
flesh, Selphie could see this clearly--and Selphie was throwing one hand back and screaming out   
the first spell that came to mind.  
  
Nothing happened.  
  
Selphie's heart sank. There was a heavy arc of blood, and then Quistis had managed to get her   
hands about the creature's throat. There was no grace in these motions -- they thrashed and   
rolled for a terse moment, and then Quistis was heaved away. She landed with a thud onto the   
floor and rolled to an arm-flinging halt.  
  
Squall and Zell were unable to do anything, for they stood about blankly, their eyes glazed   
with darkness. Selphie saw the creature push itself to its feet -- the motions were so....   
human, she found herself thinking. Were monsters that awkward? But she felt no sympathy, and   
with a cry she thrust her finger in the woman's direction.  
  
Irvine tried to lift his head. Selphie, who was practically on his back by then, pushed his   
face down onto the surface of the rock again. Realizing that pointing wouldn't work, she worked   
to vocalize her intent. "Zell! Squall! Behind you! It's all open!"  
  
Indeed it was. The woman was between the two men and a wall. Quistis was, on the other hand,   
between them and the gap. The dust was turning a ruby-black around her face, matting into her   
hair... but despite this Selphie knew that she was safer than she could have been.  
  
Both Squall and Zell whirled about to face the direction that Selphie had pointed them in. Zell   
was the first to summon his Guardian Force, and with a rush he felt a warmth in the form of a   
ringlet of light rise up around him. The air hummed, and then buzzed.  
  
But things didn't go as they were supposed to. Zell's face twitched as a sudden burst of relief   
hit him. For a moment it seemed that the air of fear had been lifted, but then, as Ifrit burst   
into his veins he felt it come anew, stronger than he had ever felt it before. His mind drew a   
blank and drew into a fetal little ball in the corner of his head, and then...  
  
Selphie's face fell as she saw the light fade out and away from Zell's frame. The young man   
stood blankly there for a moment, his shoulders stooped and his body swaying... Suddenly,   
with a buckle of one knee, he fell over on his side and was still.  
  
Blackness. It was endless and had no limit. Squall looked from side to side with the definite   
swish of his hair against the top of his eyes, lathered in sweat and trembling despite the fact   
that he held his gunblade steadily. Zell had fallen quiet, and Squall sidestepped warily, his   
feet shuffling.  
  
Selphie watched the woman eye Squall and shift from side to side for a moment. Her gaze then   
shuffled over to Quistis. The woman had stopped moving, and Selphie was beginning to fear the   
worst. She wanted to go to her, but Squall was the top priority at this time. "She's right in   
front of you, Squall!"  
  
Again, worriedly, Selphie tried another spell. Again, it didn't work, and she warily touched her   
hand to the side of her head. With a start she realized that her junctions had been broken.  
  
"In front of me?" Squall said.  
  
The woman was looking directly at Selphie now. Despite the fact that the girl could see her   
face, she still felt a wave of terror at the sight of her. However, it was not enough to drive   
her mad. Selphie did not have much time to ponder this, however, for the creature disregarded   
Squall and started moving in her direction.  
  
"Mmph." Irvine was mumbling under her arms. Selphie, with widening eyes, pushed his face down   
harder with an elbow and reached behind her to unwind her nunchaku. Her fingers were shaking so   
hard that they vibrated.  
  
However, Squall unknowingly saved her from a confrontation. Gritting his teeth and thinking,   
~to hell with it~, he lifted his hand and cast Esuna. With a flare of a radiant light his   
vision returned, and he found himself staring bewilderedly at a stone wall. Blinking against   
the light, he scuttled around and found himself facing Selphie -- and the back of the creature.  
  
Setting his teeth, he brought his gunblade up and charged.   
  
At the sudden burst of movement Selphie was able to finally tear her eyes away from the   
creature's, and she saw Squall sprinting towards it in full-fledged attack. Her heart stopped   
in shock, and that expression gave it away. The creature whirled to face him.  
  
Squall was ready. He launched off his front toe and squeezed his eyes shut at the moment she   
turned, slashing blindly in a practiced arc. Selphie watched the creature shy away with a   
rolling twist of her shoulder. Ducking, hair-flying, she avoided his second sweep.   
  
Selphie didn't watch any longer. She pushed Irvine down under the rock, hissed for him to stay   
there, and sprinted over to Quistis' form while she was still hunched over. Dropping to her   
knees, she looked over her shoulder a final time and directed her attention to Quistis,   
touching the side of her neck and then patting her cheeks. An entire side of her face was   
crimson and dusted in sand, her hair matted on that side.  
  
Quistis groaned. Selphie breathed a sigh of relief.  
  
After avoiding Squall's twin blows, the wiry woman lifted herself and slashed at him furiously.   
Squall, still pinching his eyes shut, could only strike air. His leather coat was ripped down   
to his flesh, and with a sudden rush he was knocked to the ground. The air around him whipped   
with that Feeling, and he had the sensation of his spirit being worn down with heavy sandpaper.   
He landed with a huff, his breath jolting up into his ribcage, and then he felt her heaviness   
on top of him, her claws in his shoulders  
  
Squall waited for the attack, but it never came. She was waiting; he could feel her right on   
top of him. Pressing his head back against the earth, he found his cheeks trembling with the   
effort of keeping his eyes closed. Above his eyelids he could feel her face getting very close   
to his own, could feel the inklings of... was that breath? Perhaps. The mist whipped into his   
head again, and he could feel her voice in it, rattling and eerie.  
  
"...Open your eyes." It told him.  
  
No.  
  
"Look at me."  
  
-No.-  
  
"You can't have me without seeing me."  
  
...-Have- her? Squall's breath drew into his throat and locked there, intermingled and tickling   
with dust from the floor. Everything seemed to float for a moment as the realization hit him --   
this was Zenkamuka! This human, this bony woman was the Guardian Force that they had come for!  
  
...And it would be the death of him.  
  
The air split and cracked, not even two feet away from his head, as a bullet exploded in   
Zenkamuka's left shoulder. She cried out and twisted up on top of him, and Squall used this   
opportunity to heave her off with a push of his legs. Keeping them moving, he scuttled back and   
opened his eyes a crack. She had fallen sharply, arching her back and writhing, and Squall   
looked over his shoulder with wide eyes.  
  
Irvine tipped his hat at him. "Glad you stayed down this time."  
  
"Glad you aimed."  
  
The air was as still as Zenkamuka was. Squall wanted to keep his eyes on her just as much as he   
wanted to look away, but he decided on the latter for his friends' sake. Warily, he looked over   
his shoulder at Quistis and Selphie. Selphie lifted two fingers, signaling an all clear, and   
Quistis's head rose a little. She looked dazed.  
  
Zell, however, was another matter entirely. Squall cast him a glance while he pushed himself to   
his feet, toggling between him and the fallen Guardian Force. Blood was pooling up under her in   
gross amounts. Did they bleed...? Squall had never seen this before, and it crossed his mind in   
the form of worry... And, although the air had become still it was no less tense.  
  
With silent motions he caught Irvine's eye and motioned to Zell with one finger. Irvine nodded,  
hoisted up his gun, and stepped out from behind the rock. Squall, meanwhile, took his gunblade   
tightly into both hands and slowly advanced on Zenkamuka.  
  
Everyone else in the room faded and was zoned out. It was only the body that he saw, lying   
twisted and mangled on the floor. Her long throat was arched back and one arm was bent and   
cocked at the wrist over her breast. Squall thought of a bird that had been stunned by a house   
window when he saw her, and although this was a sadder image he kept up his guard in the form   
of a raised blade.  
  
It took heavy concentration not to look at her face, which seemed to have been the source of her   
radiating terror. Squall trusted his gut on this one, quite literally. Every time he took a step   
closer his stomach knotted more tightly. Warily, he ran his eyes up her legs, to her shoulders,   
and finally her chin. His heart was pounding, but the creature was still.  
  
And then her face was snapping into his line of vision. The air screamed with a thousand voices   
and Squall followed, throwing his arm up over his eyes with a clumsy swing of his gunblade. He   
felt her eyes boring into him and then she followed physically, barreling into his stomach and   
sending him hurtling backwards with a force that kept him moving even though she was no longer   
there.  
  
Squall soon realized that she was -never- there. She had risen, yes, but something else entirely   
had struck him. The wailing air had taken on an embodiment of its own, intensified to the point   
where it knocked him off his feet. Squall winced as he thudded across the ground on one   
shoulder, and bounced--  
  
Onto nothing. He had struck the edge of the pit.  
  
"Squall!"  
  
His stomach dropped and his feet went first. The edge jostled painfully at the bottom of his   
ribcage and he huffed downward, toward nothing. A foot scraped against a smooth surface, and   
Squall did all that he could do -- he threw out his hands. He still held the gunblade, and with   
a swinging thrust he drove it into the ground at the edge of the pit. He felt his arms jerk and   
his shoulders pop at the sinews, but the blade held tight.  
  
Pebbles dropped and clattered against the vertical slope. Squall, wide-eyed, looked over his   
shoulders. He was dangling with the edge aligned with his throat, which he soon arched upward   
with his effort. Desperate now, he heaved and tensed his biceps in attempt to get himself up --   
but there were no footholds to support him. The bridge, he saw with a glance, was a frustrating   
distance away.  
  
And he couldn't help but think: I didn't watch.   
  
...I deserve this.  
  
Irvine was groaning, three paces to his left. Whatever had struck, it had hit him too--and he   
was one roll away from toppling off the edge himself. His trench coat hung open and danced in   
the stale wind that spiraled up from the pit -- it smelled of death, dank and dreary... Squall's   
flesh was beginning to chill again, worse than it already was. He was literally gagging on his   
fear.  
  
Zell had been shoved into a far edge of the wall. Selphie was lying with her back against the   
rock in the center of the room, and Quistis was basically where she had fallen -- incidentally,   
right between Squall and Zenkamuka, who's eyes were flashing (although Squall did not allow   
himself see this) and her arm was extended with its long, bone-tipped fingers dangling in the   
hollow, whispering air.  
  
Yes, it certainly had quieted again. Squall didn't have time to ponder this -- he simply tried   
to ease himself up again by the use of his gunblade -- which literally groaned and shifted a   
little in the ground. It held him dangling at an odd angle, and like a lever it threatened to   
flip over under his hold. Squall's eyes widened at it, not liking this at all, and he carefully   
tried to ease himself into a position that didn't put so much weight on the weapon...Although   
that was quite impossible.  
  
Zenkamuka's left shoulder was dangling awkwardly and dotted with bits of flesh and gore -- not   
at all a pleasant thing to look at, actually. However, what turned Squall's already frigid   
blood into ice was the way that her good hand flew back and began to acquire it's own radiance.   
  
Quistis was shakily pushing herself to her feet. Squall could tell by her motions, even though   
his fear, that her eyes were still blank and blind. The voices in the air picked up, and she   
put her hands to her ears, bending her knees in a standing cower. She didn't see Zenkamuka bring   
her hand around, nor did she see the sharp crescent of light come hurtling toward her.  
  
Squall didn't know who Zenkamuka was aiming for, although there was no doubting that he too was   
in its path, and could do nothing about it. Quistis, however, was another matter entirely. He   
let out a short cry, shouted for her to get down as best he could through the thickness that   
had settled in his throat. It was strangling him, but he had been heard. Quistis, who had always   
been rather quick, dove for the floor and landed flat. Her hair blew back and twirled in   
tendrils as it rushed past her. Squall could only brace himself and wince.  
  
There was a squeal and a snap as his gunblade was severed in two. Squalls arms would have been   
next, and that would make the end of it. Squall, however, felt his hands go loose and release   
the handle just before the blade snapped, and in a final attempt to keep a hold he let his body   
act as an anchor and painfully bring his grasp down the edge of the weapon. His fingers clung   
more and more deeply as he went, until his fists pounded into a grip right where the blade met   
the earth. He jerked and swung sharply against the cliff.  
  
The hilt of his weapon snapped and fell harmlessly onto his shoulder, before bouncing back into   
the pit. He never heard it hit bottom. His mind was driven by other things, now, as another   
flash of light went hurtling past his head and ricocheted off the wall across from him. His body   
weight was dragging him down onto the blade itself, and he felt the leather of his gloves split   
and then a warmth and pain, as his weapon cut into the joints of his fingers. Driven by a will   
to hold tight, Squall grit his teeth and begged himself to bear it to bear it. His hands were   
putting up a better fight, however, working to uncurl themselves against his will. And Squall   
could only watch this happen, dangling at an arm's length away.   
  
"Hey! Hey you! Over here!" Selphie cried. Zenkamuka looked over one shoulder and caught sight   
of the girl. Selphie's brown hair was messy and lopsided, and one entire side was covered in   
dust... but still she waved her skinny arms around wildly, with bravery that she didn't have.  
  
Meanwhile, Squall felt a pair of hands clap onto his wrists. The sight of a fluttering brown   
coat flap blocked off his vision, and then he was blissfully being lifted out from the gap.   
Irvine, puffing, dragged him onto solid earth, and Squall found that he was unable to move for   
what seemed to have been a long while. Curled up and shaking, he was finally able to peel a   
glove away from a hand. It stuck to his skin, and he saw with a grimace that deep cuts lined   
his fingers where they met his palm.  
  
"I'm not afraid of you!" Selphie cried. Literally. Zenkamuka was walking toward her by then,   
herding her toward the violent edge of the cliff. Selphie couldn't do anything but scuffle   
backwards with a stricken look on her shaking face, unable to take control. "I'm not! You can't   
scare me! Irvine, some help here!"  
  
"Get her away from Selphie and Quistis, Squall. I can't cast anything with them so nearby."   
Irvine said. He had apparently misplaced his rifle -- which was a good thing. Squall didn't   
trust the man's marksmanship, not tonight.  
  
"What about Zell?" Squall asked. The fallen man was by far the furthest from the melee.  
  
"Guuuuys..." Selphie was saying in the background.   
  
"I don't know," Irvine said.  
  
As this response, added to the sight of Quistis warily easing her blood-caked head up from the   
earth again, drove into Squall a wave of fury that sent his muscles into lock -- in the manner  
of a caged animal with nothing left for it but failure. Fuming, enraged, and at the end of his   
fuse, he locked his eyes into the back of Zenkamuka's head and pushed off into a sprint. He had   
tried this before and failed, but this time was different in two ways: he had no weapon, and his   
mind had shut down. Irvine winced at the sight of this, but braced himself with a single step   
to one side, positioning himself.  
  
She heard him coming, but it was too late. As she whirled Squall drew up his chest but kept   
moving, bringing his hand around in order to push her head away when he got near -- anything to   
avoid her face, although Squall's eyes, in his temporary madness, remained open. Like a snake   
she drew her head back and whipped it around, and her body whirled to meet him. However, what   
she did -not- expect was the fact that Squall's hands were drenched in his own blood.  
  
Suddenly, just as she turned to lock her eyes into his own she felt a spray and a sting, as   
something warm and wet snapped into her inhuman, depthless orbs. And, much like a small child   
she let out a wail and covered her face.   
  
Blinded.  
  
Squall scuttled and almost fell over, as he had planned to simply keep moving into her. However,   
at this turn of events he found himself surprised, and as she continued to claw at her   
face and whine he took two steps back, his eyes wide.  
  
A white-blue circle of light began to spin wildly around her. She never saw it coming. Selphie  
ran back as far as she could go and pressed her back against the wall, and Squall, covering his   
eyes, moved away as well.   
  
This was done just in time, and a blast of ice came bursting up, shaped by that circle of   
light. Squall felt his face burn with cold, and then with a wary glance he looked out from   
under the sanctuary of his elbow.  
  
Zenkamuka stood, frozen in a column of blue-tinted ice. She was trapped in the motion of   
hunching over and covering her eyes with both hands. If Squall didn't know better, he would   
have thought that she was crying.  
  
  
  
Zell heaved a long and pain-laden groan. Wincing, he put the back of his hand over his eyes and   
rubbed them, before rolling them open drunkenly. He drearily found himself face-to-face with   
Irvine and Selphie, who were looking down at him with victorious little grins. Squall stood   
behind them with his arms crossed, and Quistis was at his side. She had been cleaned up a   
little, but a trio of scars ran up from beneath her jaw -- they still oozed a little, and she   
looked pale.   
  
He took his eyes away from her and winced again, rolling up onto his back. Taking a few short   
breaths, he finally uttered, "What in the -hell- just happened?"  
  
"Your Guardian Force, that's what happened." Squall said. Zell did a double-take right there   
where he lay, and then was surprised all over again. Everyone else waited for it to sink in,   
just as Squall had done when he first delivered the news.   
  
"-What-?!" Zell finally said.  
  
Squall repeated himself. Zell couldn't believe it.  
  
"But..."  
  
"I've got to hand it to you," Irvine said bitterly. "That was certainly a challenge, buddy."  
  
"...Sorry?" Zell tried.  
  
"And lucky to be talking to us," Selphie said with a wink. She took his hand and helped Zell to   
his feet -- which was tough in itself, on account that the man was still wobbling. He was as   
white as Zenkamuka had been, and still looked mildly out of place.  
  
"Are you alright?" Quistis finally asked.  
  
"...I think so." Zell replied.  
  
"Do you remember what happened?" Irvine asked.   
  
And as they began to chatter about the battle that they just had, Squall decided that he had no   
interest. He was lucky to be alive. It was hard, remembering the last time that a Guardian   
Force did that to him... Zenkamuka had no special attacks, not really... but rather, a way of   
shredding his confidence. He still felt it. Weak.   
  
While Zell spoke of not remembering himself going down and squabbled with Quistis over the   
stupidity of casting blind on them all, Squall wandered over to the small prison cell of ice   
and looked up at it with his arms crossed over his chest and his hands under his jacket for   
warmth. Carefully, his eyes wandered about the strange pose that she had been captured in, and   
again he wondered, wondered....  
  
He was so lost in his thoughts that he nearly jumped at the feeling of a hand on his shoulder.   
It was just Irvine, however. Next to him was Quistis, who was unconsciously touching the wounds   
on her face and Selphie, who was supporting Zell. He looked less disorientated, although Irvine   
was the one who ended up speaking. "Are you okay?"  
  
"I've been better," Squall admitted.  
  
"Tell me about it."  
  
They all stood together in silence for a moment, feeling like a unit once more, no one better   
or worse than the person they stood beside. There was a bit of awe about it all, although in a   
few days they all would be admitting that nothing good came from this adventure -- that they'd   
lost more than they had gained.  
  
But there, on that day, at that moment... They were at their peak.  
  
Irvine was the first one to speak up. "...The most compatible gets it." This was a fact, the   
method that they'd always used to decide over these matters. They all had fought equally; they   
all had contributed to the cause... And in the end, it was the Guardian Force itself that   
decided who was best suited for it.  
  
Squall frowned a little at the comment. He wasn't sure how much he actually wanted this   
creature, and had a feeling that everyone felt the same way. It was a bittersweet affair. And,   
as if exchanging their thoughts, everyone cast each other a glance and begrudgingly put their   
fingertips toward the column of ice and the creature within.  
  
No one knew quite how the process worked, or how it was that one person was more fitting than   
another. It was simply the way that it had always been and what they had been taught. Their   
blood began to tingle and boil, a small light danced at the tip of their fingers and up in a   
narrow line to their elbows.... When the sensation reached its peak and the air began to hum   
pointedly, they slipped open their eyes and slid them about.  
  
Squall looked down. His light was the brightest by far.  
  
"Junction it, Squall." Irvine said.  
  
"You trapped her." Squall said.  
  
"With your help."   
  
Selphie rubbed at a bare and chilly shoulder, thus eliminating the meager beam of light that   
she had created. "She's yours. It's already decided." Zell and Quistis nodded at this.   
  
He didn't make a sound, but inwardly Squall heaved a long and weary sigh. Wetting his lips with   
a little roll of his tongue, he turned his eyes up toward the pitiful creature that was   
temporarily frozen in time, posed like a miserable and sobbing child that had blood in her eyes   
instead of tears. Zenkamuka. Another Guardian Force among many.  
  
He put a finger to his temple.   
  
  
  
  
End Part 7/?  
To be Continued.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	9. Part Eight

"Everywhere I go I see your face  
And every sound I hear is the sound of your voice  
Why are you haunting me?  
Why are you haunting me?  
Why can't I let you go?"  
--Stabbing Westward  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part VIII  
  
Location: The Time of the Sixth World  
Two Eternities Before Present Day  
  
It had been centuries since the child called Kai had been felled to her certain doom by the   
arrows of the same men who had at one time put food on her plate. However, these later times   
were not that different then they were before. Scholars spoke of an age of advancement, when   
technology was at its peak, yes... but they had also spoken of war, a war so harsh and so long   
that it had eradicated everything that they had built, so that life had to start anew. People   
lived as they did in the past, and machinery was at a low. It seemed, many people thought   
bitterly, that technology only rose in terms of weaponry.  
  
And they still feared magic.   
  
They hated it, in fact.  
  
The man called Barrus Myre had seen a number of witches slain in his lifetime, and he could not   
say that he felt any empathy for them. His hatred was kept strong by his fear, fed by stories   
that he had heard since childhood -- magic was evil, and once a person had been touched by it...   
He was lost. Everything that came in contact with him was lost.   
  
Barrus had always considered himself to be a good man and a fair man when it came to the bare   
bones of life. He loved his wife, he loved his parents, and he loved the village in which he   
lived with a great passion. He would have died for it, and everything that he did was only for   
the purpose of helping those that he felt strongly for.  
  
...He wasn't evil.  
  
Was he?  
  
But the voice in his head told him something entirely different.  
  
It had just -been- there one day. He had been feeling achy and listless since that morning, and   
the feeling hadn't improved into the afternoon. It was then, while he was chopping a load of   
firewood, when he first heard it. He had nearly cut his foot off in his surprise. Whirring   
about, he cast his face around the clearing where he stood, but there was nothing there.   
Nothing.  
  
A songbird had trilled. Teasingly.  
  
That had been a month ago. He had tried to hide it. At first, it was easier. The voice was   
nothing more than a whisper, something that came to him unexpected and quietly, like a hush.   
Now, however, as time began to wear on him this plague took it's toll, too. The words in his   
head got stronger, came more frequently, and at night he whispered statements that were not   
his own.  
  
His hair was slowly beginning to grey.  
  
The night when everything shattered had been the end of a normal day. The voice was not as   
strong, but whatever was in his head sat oddly, as if it were unsettled and expectant. Overall,   
it was ominous, but Barrus was too set on hiding it to realize what this may have meant for him.  
  
He didn't want to be evil. He didn't want to be a witch. He didn't want to die.   
  
His home seemed too small for him that evening. It had only two rooms, the main living area and   
a bedroom in the back. Barrus had seated himself at the table, clomping down onto the bench at   
one side and setting his boots flat on the wooden floor. Clasping his hands and resting his   
forearms on the table, he leaned forward with a swinging twist of his sweaty blonde hair and   
stared into space.  
  
It felt as if he were just taking a short rest, to ease his cluttered brain.  
  
Four hours had passed.  
  
He would have continued to sit there for much longer, if not for one startling realization --   
his head had miraculously silenced. Suddenly, his vision swam and his eyelids blinked, as   
everything warped around him. He was awakening, coming out of a trance--  
  
And it leapt onto him more powerfully than it ever had before. It dug its claws into his mind   
and almost made his eyes bug out. Barrus fought at it, tried to push it away... The sensation   
was too much, like a wave that had finally washed coolly onto his feet, only to pull back and   
tease him again.  
  
"Go away." He hissed through his gritted teeth. His voice echoed off the walls.  
  
"...You'll regret it." Barrus didn't know it yet, but his moving lips were producing a sound.   
He was replying to himself, the creature was using his mouth to make its soft, vapor-like   
ghosts of words.   
  
"You'll regret it," It said through him.   
  
"I already do."  
  
"You need me."  
  
"You've done nothing for me."  
  
"You have no idea what I've done."  
  
Barrus was hunching over again. His spine and the muscles of his back spasmed with his desperate   
effort to keep control over something that had already long consumed him. His face was dripping   
and the warmth from the fireplace to his left suddenly seemed to hot. That side of his body was   
aching, searing, screaming...and everything else, in contrast, felt shockingly cold.  
  
Like a corpse.  
  
"They're afraid of you." It whispered.  
  
"They don't know."  
  
"We'll tell them."  
  
"We won't."  
  
"We can be powerful, strong enough so that no one can touch us." It teased, it taunted, it   
baited and licked at his insides like a honeyed tongue, leaving a gooey residue in its wake.   
Barrus was getting dazed and dizzy... the flickering dance of the firelight gave the shadows a   
strobe effect, burning at his irises and eating at the human part of his brain.  
  
His world swam and screamed. Barrus hissed his objections, but the voice just kept coming,   
talking half through his lips and half within his skull. It was a no-win situation, Barrus   
knew, and his hope scuttled back into a corner of his mind, as his consciousness became thicker   
and thicker.  
  
"Go away." His words were slurred, drunken.  
  
"This is a Gift, what you will have. Do you want to deny it, Mortal, do you dare--"  
  
Barrus left no time for negotiations. His attempts to fight this disease was based on instinct,   
now, animalistic and desperate. "Get out of my head!!" The uncontrolled volume of his voice rose   
and filled the room with a snap so sharp that the firelight almost seemed to shudder and shift   
away from him. "Get OU--"  
  
"Barrus?"  
  
The sound was like a tiny thread that drew him vaguely into a peephole to reality. The woman's   
voice was raw and real, so human to him that it almost seemed foreign. The haze in front of   
Barrus' red-rimmed eyes cleared enough so that he could see the worried form of his wife   
standing in front of him on the other side of the table.  
  
Her dark eyes were wide and wary. How much had she heard? Barrus felt his heart ping at the   
mere sight of her. The woman was named Alexis, and her beauty was the kind that, although not   
perfect, would ripen gracefully with age. Her dark brown hair was piled up at the back of her   
head and her slight shoulders were adorned with a simple dress. Nothing was fancy in these   
times, and Alexis was no exception. She was sweaty and unkempt, and looked exhausted. A thin   
hand spread across the wide expanse of her swollen belly in an almost protective gesture, and   
she studied him with tense lines running across her lips.  
  
Was she afraid of him, wary for their unborn child? Barrus couldn't bear the thought, and those   
images came to him often. After contracting the demon within his brain he realized just what   
danger he may end up posing to the ones he loved, and came to the painful conclusion that he   
may soon never be able to see them again. He had always loved his wife and looked forward to   
bearing a son or daughter... but now, after this, he realized just how intense his feelings   
were. Why was it that the true magnitude of his love had to be brought out by tragedy?  
  
The longer he thought these things to himself, the longer his wife stared. Finally, the webs   
across her mouth drew downward into a frown and she shifted off to one side with a rustle,   
moving around the table and thus towards him. Barrus saw this and panicked, suddenly so very   
afraid that she would see something that she shouldn't have.  
  
He pushed his head up from his hands and scooted back in his chair a little, too mindless at   
this point to realize just how jerkily he moved. "No!" He cried, loud enough to startle her.   
And, as her eyebrows knitted and she jolted he tried to recover, pushing his voice into a more   
normal tone that was almost too soft to hear.  
  
"I'm fine," He said. Barrus tried not to growl this. He could feel it, the creature pushing   
inside of him and trying to get out, trying to expose itself to the woman. It took all of his   
efforts to keep it subdued, although he knew that he had little time.  
  
"You look ill," Alexis said. This was an understatement, and she felt almost foolish for saying   
it. Her eyes, however, the almost terrified look on her face seemed to make up for it tenfold.   
Her words were trite, but her expression was impacting.  
  
"I'm fine," Barrus said again, stressing the words this time. Alexis clearly didn't believe   
him, and with a shift and groan--the pressure, it was becoming physical now--he managed to   
utter, "I just have a lot on my mind." Ha. She had no idea.  
  
"...Can you tell me about it?"  
  
"Later. I'll come to bed in a short while, we can talk then."  
  
She looked hesitant, but also relieved. Barrus had always refused to talk to her; he had always   
found some excuse... and although she was no less in the dark than she had been before, at least   
he was finally offering to open a link between them. She shifted her weight, ran her thumb down   
the slope of her belly carefully, and moistened her lips with a vague and tense glisten.   
  
"I talked to the midwife today. She says that it will be soon. Tomorrow..." Why wasn't he   
looking at her? That wild glint in his eyes... It was unnerving. Alexis visibly hesitated for a   
moment. "Tomorrow, she'll come and stay with us."  
  
"That soon?"  
  
His words were clipped in a way that seemed to close the conversation where it stood. Alexis   
felt the corners of her eyes crinkle a little and her chest constricted. Warily, she took a   
step backwards. "Yes." And he offered only a nod, not even bothering to make a vocal effort any   
longer.  
  
"...I'll be in our room." She said, and was about to add something more to that. However, she   
changed her mind and simply retreated through the wooden door that separated their sleeping   
area from the main room. Carefully, she shifted a glance in his direction over one shoulder as   
she left... but he didn't even put his face her way.  
  
As she closed the door, she swore that she heard someone hissing into the air behind her with a   
low, sinister tone.  
  
It was as if Barrus had held his breath during the entire conversation. When his wife left the   
room his burning lungs reached their limit and shoved air out through his lips, pulling him back  
out of control. With his last ebbs of strength he slammed his palms against the table and heaved  
himself to his feet -- he had to leave the house.  
  
And then, without warning, something violently shoved onto him. It was physical, although Barrus   
could not see it. With a jerk and a crack he was sent hurtling back into his seat, and his   
first lacings of fear turned into blatant panic.  
  
"...No..." He hissed.  
  
"Louder."  
  
"I won't let you get the best of me." Again, he spoke low.  
  
"Louder."  
  
"No."  
  
"Let your wife hear you."  
  
"Damn you."  
  
"Then let us both be damned."  
  
"No!" The word came out a strangled roar, and along with it came a strong crash. Barrus cast a   
glance to one side through his sweat-teared eyes, and realized that his fist had slammed onto   
the table. A silent, painfully tense moment passed... so silent that he could hear his wife   
breathing in the other room.  
  
"She sounds scared."  
  
"Shut up."  
  
"Do you hear that? She's puffing."  
  
"Leave me alone!"  
  
By this time Barrus was having a full conversation with himself, to the point where he did not   
realize just how strange this sounded. For, as time went on the voice sounded increasingly   
familiar, fitted more and more into place... and slowly but surely, began to radiate its   
thoughts into his head. He was beginning to sense the direction that it was going, and even his   
hazy glimpse down that path turned his bones into ice.  
  
"I'll tell you what..." The voice, the voice that was his own and yet didn't belong to him   
seemed to ominously shift tone. Barrus didn't want to listen, but his lips freezed and said   
what the creature wanted him to say, his legs stiffened and held him firmly into his seat.  
  
"Barrus?" His wife's voice came filtering from the other room.  
  
"...There are plenty of people in this house who are not you."  
  
Barrus, the human side of him, the side that was already half-way falling into a pit that had   
no end, felt his blood grow sharp. His veins tore and split into fraying shards, so intense was   
his terror. "Leave her alone!" He cried.  
  
"Who said anything about your wife?" His vocal cords replied in a song-like calm.  
  
"Barrus?" She sounded so far away.  
  
Barrus' nostrils flared and his fingernails curled little splinters from the wooden table. And   
then, suddenly, with a rush of fear he felt that presence inside of him shift into a cool and   
relieving mist... it was unlatching itself from him. Realizing what was happening, Barrus let   
out a cry and tensed all of the muscles tightly into his body, squeezing up his mind like a   
fist... anything to keep it inside.  
  
"Leave them alone!!" He roared, and with a jerk his body was heaved upward. He lost all   
coherency, all sense of movement, and there was a jolting pain in his shoulder as he struck a   
wall, the corner of the fireplace, a shelf... Wincing, he clenched his hands to the side of his   
face and squeezed his eyes shut, his nostrils and his mouth. Anything, anything to keep the   
danger at bay.  
  
He couldn't breathe.  
  
He couldn't think.  
  
He couldn't....  
  
From within the deep recesses of the family bedroom, his wife began to scream.  
  
  
  
  
End Part 8/?  
To Be Continued.  



	10. Part Nine

"Someone tell me why   
I do the things   
That I don't wanna do   
When you're around me   
I'm somebody else   
There is good reason I guess   
Having once gone too far   
When you clean out the hive   
Does it make you want to cry?"  
--Guided by Voices  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part IX  
  
Anger had a smell, Zell realized. He decided that he didn't like it.  
  
Along with the odor of that fury came the strange, clean scent of medicines and sanitizers,   
gauze and disinfectants. He was sitting on the infirmary cot with Quistis on one side and Squall   
on the other. They were partially the source of the anger in the air, and as a result he   
squeezed his shoulders in and hunched a little, as if trying to avoid their touch. Each rub of   
Squall's leather coat on his arm was grating and prominent.  
  
It was Dr. Kadowaki, however, who was the most imposing. She stood angrily with her fists   
planted on her thick hips and her feet spread apart like a white-smocked warrior, and with a   
glare she regarded the five of them--Irvine was standing by the wall and Selphie was sitting on   
the end of the bed, closest to Squall--in a long lived silence.  
  
When she finally spoke, Zell felt the muscles of his face shift into a grimace.   
  
"Going after a Guardian Force that you don't know about is one thing, but not telling anyone is   
another. Those were private records that you broke into, which is not only immoral but also   
illegal. Furthermore, what if something terrible had happened to you in Centra? We had no idea   
where you were! You five are supposed to be -role models- in this Academy! Do you know what   
doing this sa--Zell Dincht, don't you -dare- look at me like that. I do -not- like people   
making faces at me."  
  
Zell twisted his lips and looked down at his feet. Quistis cast him a sidelong glance and   
caught Squall's profile instead. There was a bandage on his skin for his burn scar. It reminded   
her of the day of his SeeD exam, when he had been wounded by Seifer Almasy. She now sported   
scars of her own. On the slope of her jaw, below a taped angle of gauze, was a trio of gashes.   
It hurt to move her mouth.  
  
And yet, despite this, she talked. "We were under the impression that Xu had given us permission   
to go to Centra," She said. Nearby, Selphie nodded. Zell ground further down into his seat.   
Squall seemed stony and stoic, almost immobile. The wild-haired blonde could feel Irvine and   
Kadowaki's eyes on him, and twittered inwardly.  
  
"I don't know what to say," Dr. Kadowaki said tersely. "I just hope that Xu is more sympathetic   
than I am. Honestly, I don't know what to say that doesn't involve fists of rage -- and that   
says a lot, for a medical type." She let out a little huff. "It's ridiculous, actually. To   
think, she and the headmaster were planning a celebration for the Garden in your honor when you   
five came staggering in this morning."  
  
Selphie brightened and then dimmed within a single facial expression and Zell rubbed his arm.   
Next to him, Squall sighed a little.  
  
"...We can still go to the party, can't we?" Selphie asked worriedly. Squall and Kadowaki,   
almost a unit in their motion, both turned and cast her an odd, almost blaring look. Selphie   
made a little ~huh-wha?~ squeaking sound, stared at them, and then looked at her hands in order   
to mumble, "I was just asking. Geez."  
  
"I can't believe this." Irvine finally said from his corner. He was leaning back with his arms   
crossed over his chest, looking a little congested in his trench-coat and obscuring hat.   
"Timber? You all were told that we were sightseeing in -Timber-?"  
  
Quistis snorted sarcastically. Zell, getting quite indignant, lifted his head and sneered at   
her. "And this is coming from the chick who was -blinding- us left and right? And it was   
Fisherman's Horizon, Irvine, thank you very much."  
  
"Can I hit him?" Irvine asked dully.  
  
Dr. Kadowaki, not in the mood to hear such bantering, rolled her eyes and rubbed her forehead.   
"I'm going to dig up some medication for Quistis to take with her. If I hear a sound from you   
-children- when you leave, I'm going to give you all a better reason to put it to use, if you   
catch my drift."  
  
"...I'm getting too old for this," She added wearily in her departure, getting a series of   
stares from her charges.  
  
"Gee, you'd think an infirmary would have better atmosphere, huh?" Zell said when the door   
closed. He looked around at them, but his attempt at a grin was met by dull, dry glares. With   
the source of his guilt out of the room he erupted into an indignant huff, before exclaiming,   
"Guys! I can't believe you're doing this! We just got through an adventure together, here!"  
  
"I should have known," Squall muttered, rubbing his face a little. "It was all there, I just   
didn't think...Zell, Xu is going to--"  
  
"She's going to skewer you, that's what she's going to do. And I'm going to be glad!" Quistis   
interjected.  
  
"What? Glad?!" Zell cried. "You're kidding me guys...right? Guys?"  
  
"We almost -died-." Irvine said flatly.  
  
"Oh, come -on-," Zell snapped at him over his shoulder, before sliding his glance across the   
faces of the others. "Come on, guys. That thing hardly phase--Well, okay, it scared us, but it   
wasn't because it was -scary-. It had monster B.O. or something."  
  
"Point being...?" Quistis asked flatly. Zell winced slightly at the sight of the gauze on her   
jaw, but quickly managed to recover -- and lifted his chin in response.  
  
"Point being, we have some flesh wounds and a few cases of the heebie-jeebies to recuperate from.   
That's all. Gods, why are you guys getting so -indignant- on me, here?"  
  
"Excuse me?" Irvine snapped. He had pushed off the wall by then, and with flashing eyes he   
moved around the bed so that he could jab a finger into the young man's face. "I almost shot   
Squall, Quistis was nearly slashed to bits, and Selphie nearly lost her..." He cast the girl a   
glance and curbed his words with a rolling grind of his teeth. They all knew what he was going   
to say, anyway. "And you," He eventually continued. "You were out like a light--"  
  
"It's not like I've never been unconscious before--"  
  
"--Without having the thing even -touch- you." Irvine finished, without even skipping a beat.   
"According to Selphie--"  
  
"Who was blind," Zell said. "Thanks to Ms. Blinding-Lady."  
  
"Ooh, clever." Quistis snapped. "You're an idiot when you're angry... Hell, you're an idiot all   
the way around -- -sightseeing- in -Timber-?!"  
  
"Guys," Selphie said.  
  
"Fisherman's Horizon," Zell retorted. "And, unlike -your- strategy, my idea worked."  
  
"Guys?"  
  
"Worked? I was trying to cover your back! That's better than what you did to us!"  
  
"Guys!" Selphie raised her voice, and everyone looked over at her with a start, having been   
torn out of their individual thoughts and arguments. "I wasn't blind." She said. "Neither was   
Irvine -- I -saw- Quistis get attacked."  
  
"...So?" Zell said. "You avoided Quistis' wrath, so wha--Ow! Squall!"  
  
Squall had jabbed an elbow into the man's side and cast him a tight-lipped little frown in   
return to his glare. The look was brief, the ghost of an emotion, and then he was talking,   
looking up at Irvine, and then over at Quistis. "What about Selphie, anyway?" He asked. Everyone   
narrowed their eyes at him questioningly, on account that he had apparently deterred from the   
argument.   
  
Realizing quite suddenly through the silence that he had gotten the floor, Squall felt himself   
at a loss for a moment. It took him awhile to bring himself to explain properly. "I mean, I've   
just realized... You were calling out instructions for us, Selphie. That means that you were   
looking at her. I had thought that it was something on her face--"  
  
"Her eyes, I think."  
  
"But you were -facing- her, Selphie."  
  
"I know," Selphie said. "And I got really scared...but not like before. Before, before..." She   
actually pushed out a shudder. "Before, it was horrible. I just remembered seeing something in   
that face, something was talking to me in those eyes, and I..."  
  
"Maybe it was something else?" Quistis said. "Maybe it had nothing to do with her face..."  
  
"Maybe," Zell said. "It wasn't from her at all. I mean, if Selphie could have looked at her,   
why couldn't we? How could we know, with Quistis -blinding- everyone left and right?"  
  
"Hey," Squall said, lifting his hand before Quistis could retort. He couldn't stop her eyes   
from narrowing into hard points, though, and he almost trembled inwardly at the intensity of   
her gaze. When she got mad, she got -mad-. "We can't prove anything... Quistis was just trying   
her best to help, and honestly... That thing's strategy..."  
  
Squall remembered the feeling that had come over him when her face had hovered above his closed   
eyes, the boring of her gaze into his skull. That tension, the fear, the -terror- that washed   
over him when she whispered for him to open his eyes...it was as clear as a bell. It still   
irked him, in fact.  
  
"...It was something that we had to see," He added.  
  
"Uh huh. Nothing a little extra-strength deodorant could have taken care of, that's what I   
say." Zell said.  
  
"I can hit him now, right?" Irvine said. "We're all alone in here, no one would have to find   
out, if we didn't want them to."  
  
"Oh, just shove it already." Zell snapped.  
  
  
  
That morning in Esthar was a dreary one. The storm from the night before still lingered in the   
form of grey skies and drizzling droplets of cold rain. Beads collected and swam about the   
shiny metal surfaces of space-age buildings, and the clear glass walkway under Rinoa's feet was   
misted over.   
  
It was early morning, and her footprints were the only ones there. Perhaps, in a while, the sun   
would come and wash the fog away, but now when Rinoa looked back and saw that single pair of   
prints she felt very alone, more than she ever remembered. She glanced over her shoulder to   
look at them often, even though it depressed her.  
  
She wore a thick woolen grey coat and hugged it around her in order to ward off the cold. It   
felt soft and stiff, but there was a flat rectangular obstruction that dug into her arms and   
called her fingers to it. She curled her hands tightly around it, so that her knuckles became   
frigid and white... but for the life of her, she did not let that box go.  
  
"What is this?" She had asked Laguna on the night before, in that cozy and dark conference room.   
He had looked over at her with his dark, thoughtful eyes--Squall's eyes, she thought idly,   
although that was probably more because Squall was on her mind--and simply offered it to her.  
  
"Open it."  
  
Rinoa, her hands shaking, had lifted the top of the box from the bottom and set it aside. It   
was funny, how slow her motions were... as if she were almost dreading something, although that   
had not been the case. And then, without breathing, she looked down at it and found that she did   
not understand just what she was gazing at.  
  
"I knew your mother once," Laguna had said to her then. "She and I were very good friends, back   
when I was a young man." The fine wrinkles on his face warped as he smiled wanly to her. "Back,   
a very long time ago... after she had married your father, she had left this in my care." The   
way he eyed the box, it seemed almost that he was touching it, even though his hands were   
casually under his chin. "...I think that you are more deserving of it than I am."  
  
"But she gave it to you," Rinoa said with a spark of hesitation in her voice. "I think that she   
knew what she was doing..." Her voice was shaking, and although Rinoa scolded herself inwardly   
and tried to curb it, she found that she could not.  
  
"It would have fallen into your hands at one time or another, Rinoa." Laguna replied. "Now is   
as good a time as any. After all... there may come a time when I will be unable to have this   
chance again."  
  
Rain blew off a roof and onto the street, pelting Rinoa heavily with it. Drawing out of her   
memories, she pulled up the collar of her coat and shielded herself. Something began to whirr   
and the street vibrated for a moment under her feet, as one of the many internal generators   
surged and continued to run beneath the city floors. The wind dropped, and the rain went back   
to a minor sprinkle. Rinoa's fallen face shifted and whirled into a frown. If only the   
conversation had stopped there. It was difficult enough, thinking back on her mother's death...   
but the rest of it seemed harsher and more ominous. Laguna was trying to tell her something,   
and she didn't like what that something was.  
  
"Rinoa!"   
  
She lifted her head sharply and was struck with a burst of cold. Behind her was Ellone, who   
was tugging her shawl tightly around her shoulders for warmth. Although Rinoa was not in a mood   
to talk, not then...she still found herself slowing and waiting for the woman to catch up.  
  
"It's so early. What are you doing out?" She asked breathlessly as she jogged to Rinoa's side.   
Rinoa kept walking, and Ellone followed more casually, although she was puffing a little and   
her cheeks were rosy. Pushing a strand of brown hair back from her eyes, she turned her head   
and glanced over at Rinoa's profile questioningly.  
  
"Just walking a little," Rinoa said.  
  
"Did Uncle Laguna keep you up all night?"  
  
He most certainly had. Their conversation went late, and Rinoa had been unable to sleep after   
it was finished. When she left the conference room in order to go to her room in the palace for   
the night, she found herself unable to stop, and had been walking around the city all night and   
into the morning.  
  
She didn't tell Ellone this, however. She simply shook her head.   
  
"...Are you staying tonight, too?"  
  
"I'd like to get home soon," Rinoa admitted. She felt guilty for saying it, however. This was a   
beautiful city, a peaceful city, and a place to be proud of. But Rinoa had decided that she   
would choose the war-laced Garden over this anytime.   
  
"Oh, do wait and stay a while, at least through tomorrow," Ellone said. "Ikyua--do you remember   
him?--was talking about taking us to the north side of the city tomorrow night. They really   
fixed it up, after we started getting tourists. There's so much to do there. I think you could   
use a little fun, you know." Again, her hand twisted at her hair and her fine white teeth were   
vaguely exposed in her partial smile. "Besides, you could keep in contact with Balamb through   
our transmissions. I think it would be a good way to test it. We hope to get casual calls out   
by the end of the year."  
  
"...I'll think about it." Rinoa said. "But I'd like to try and contact home tonight."  
  
"Deling?" Ellone asked quizzically.  
  
Rinoa, realizing her mistake, quickly corrected herself. "The Garden, I mean. Balamb."  
  
Ellone fell silent for a moment and tugged her shawl more closely about herself. Looking at her   
feet walking on the misted glass, she tried to pretend that there was no tension between them.   
They hadn't known each-other that long, but the adventure that had drawn them both into its   
grasp made their relationship tighter. However, Ellone didn't know what to say at this moment,   
just as she hadn't been able to find the right words since Rinoa's arrival.  
  
"...What's bothering you?" She finally got to the point.  
  
"I don't know," Rinoa replied. It was odd, she realized... because she was telling the truth.   
She really didn't know. "A lot of things, I guess. My future. Squall... he was going out after   
some Guardian Force with everyone else yesterday. I guess I'm worried about that, and feel a   
little left out because I'm not going. I mean, they had their past in the orphanage, and they'll   
always have that... but me, I'm an outsider--"  
  
"You're far from it, Rinoa."  
  
"Not yet." She smiled wanly. "Someday, maybe."  
  
"Is that why you're upset? Really, Rinoa..." Ellone continued. As always, her compassion melted   
out through a sterner exterior. By then they had stopped under the sloping roof of a building   
and set their backs to it. In front of them was the startling and fog-drenched cityscape of   
Esthar...breathtaking, even when Rinoa didn't feel much like being in awe.  
  
She asked herself Ellone's question and realized that no, that was not at all the cause. It was   
Laguna and what he had said to her, what this memento of her mother's life meant to her, as   
well as what it suggested....  
  
...Everything. It meant everything, and yet it meant nothing.  
  
"What does this all mean?" She had asked Laguna last night in the conference room. He hadn't   
been able to answer her, and when Rinoa thought back to consult her own memories, she realized   
just how shattered her past was.  
  
She couldn't remember her mother anymore.  
  
"I'll get over it," Rinoa finally replied to Ellone. She curled up into herself and watched the   
rain fall. "I always do."  
  
  
End Part 9/?  
To Be Continued.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	11. Part Ten

"Difficult not to feel a little bit  
Disappointed and passed over  
When I looked right through  
To see you Naked and Oblivious  
But you don't see me..."  
--A Perfect Circle  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part X  
  
  
"I'm scared," The little girl said.  
  
"Why?"   
  
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you." She was very pretty, at least in the boy's eyes. Her   
dark hair was messy and limp, though, it looked damp. She was sitting next to him on a little   
wooden bridge that was more for show than efficiency, on account that he could jump the river   
with ease. She swung her feet idly, not looking very frightened in the least. This made the   
little boy very curious.  
  
"How do you know?" He asked skeptically, dangling his toes in the cold current.  
  
"I just do," She said.  
  
The scrawny boy looked over at her. He was as messy as she was, he could feel it in the form of   
the greasy hair on the back of his neck, his bony chest and legs, and the tatters of his clothes   
against his flesh, a simple pair of trousers. "Why'd you tell me that, then?"  
  
"Tell you what?"  
  
"That you're scared."  
  
"Well," The girl said thoughtfully, "If I tell you now, maybe you'll know."  
  
"Know that you're scared?"  
  
"Yes." The girl declared. "That way, you'll know that I'm just as scared as you are."  
  
"...But...I'm not scared."  
  
"...You will be." She said.  
  
  
  
"Squall?"   
  
His face crunched and through his strangled nostrils he tried to bring in a rush of clean air,   
and with that air a touch of reality. The pull from sleep to arousal was slow and straining.   
Steadily, paced, Squall became aware of the made-up bed beneath his back, the blaring overhead   
lights, and the familiar smells of his dorm room.  
  
~Strange~, he thought.  
  
"Yo, Squall? You up?"  
  
Squall rubbed his face eagerly and felt something slip away from him... not so much fear as it   
was... discomfort. He had been very uncomfortable. And cold... Gods, was he cold. Tiredly, he   
rubbed at his face and cracked open his eyes in order to look up at the man who had been talking   
-- although the voice said it all.  
  
"You sleep too much, man!" Zell said. He was dressed regally in his SeeD uniform with the front   
neatly buttoned and his chin forced high by the stiff collar... but it didn't change his posture   
or the fact that his hair still flew about in waves. With great exaggeration he tapped his watch   
and then pointed to the dark window. "You got up this morning, walked to the cafeteria for a   
while, and then slept. You call that living it up?"  
  
Squall, who was half-awake and still offish about the events of the day before, cast the young   
man a level look. Zell's face tightened and his lips forced into an exaggerated smile as he   
forced himself to be totally oblivious to Squall's response -- although he didn't mention the   
subject of 'living up' again. That was too close to 'great challenge,' and for some odd reason   
his companions seemed to frown upon the concept.   
  
"Anyway," Zell said, scratching at the back of his head a little. "The party, you know. I'd say   
we could make our entrance in about a half-hour... I figured that I'd wake you up now... you're   
one of those guys who like to spend a lot of time preening, right?"  
  
Again, Squall didn't seem amused.  
  
"...Sheesh, man. You'd think a guy wouldn't be so cranky after his nappy-wappy."  
  
Squall grunted a response. By then he had shifted and pushed himself into a seated position at   
the edge of the bed with his feet on the floor and his hands holding him up on either side. He   
was struck with a wave of déjà vu, but the sensation passed.   
  
"Yeah, so that's it--Oh! Oh, man! Wait!" Zell had blissfully put his unusually excited self--he   
was almost crackling with energy--toward the door, but at his outburst he spun around once more,   
waving his arms as if missiles were coming toward the Garden again and he had almost forgotten   
to tell anyone. "Rinoa!"  
  
"...What about her? Is she back?" Immediately Squall moved to ease himself to his feet.  
  
"No, oh no." Zell had calmed a little, almost reassuringly, and with a little snicker he added.   
"And -now- you talk. Bring up Rinoa and it's like..." He stiffened his shoulders and made his   
hands into tight little claws, before droning on. "It's aliiiive."  
  
Squall, who had settled back onto the bed, glared.  
  
"Blaaargh, alliiive, alli--" Zell, still in his zombie-impersonation, slid his eyes down onto   
Squall. "Gee. You're not amused. Why am I not surprised?" And, with that, he dropped his hands   
and said casually. "She sent a transmission from Esthar. They can only do a few minutes at a   
time, and we wouldn't have been able to fetch you before it ended. It takes a few hours for the   
system to re-charge or whatever, so she'll try again tonight. She says not to have too much fun   
without her... Something about not letting other girls hypnotize you into dancing with them or   
something? What's up with that?"  
  
"Nothing," Squall muttered.  
  
"Fine. Sorry I asked." Zell fluttered his hands around. "Get ready, I'll see you at the party.   
Take your time, it's not like you'll be the life of it."  
  
"Ouch." Squall said sarcastically.  
  
Zell winked playfully at him and walked out of the bedroom with a disco-like squiggle in his   
step. Down the hall Squall could hear an off-key version of 'Staying Alive.'  
  
Making his lips into an 'o' shape, Squall pushed out a whistle and rolled his eyes a little.   
Achingly he eased himself to his feet and rubbed at his shoulders. That fight had done a number   
on him, that was for certain. It would be a few days until he would be in top shape, even with   
the magic that had been used on him.  
  
Idly, he slipped out of his leather jacket--heh, only a soldier would nap while fully   
dressed--and threw it on the bed. With a cracking stoop of his shoulders he took one hand into   
another and looked down at his palm. Peeling the gauze away from it with a nauseating pull of   
flesh and smell of medicines, he looked at the twin scars that ran along the joints where his   
fingers met his palm, as well as on the hinge of the thumb. The markings were the same on his   
other hand. His lip curled a little in stoic disgust.  
  
On the table was the bottom half of his gunblade. It was useless, only the hilt would have been   
of worth or personal value... But the thing had saved his life countless times... and yesterday   
had been the last. His blade was broken beyond repair.  
  
Scoffing at himself for mourning a weapon, Squall tightly re-wrapped his palms and unfastened   
his belt. Idly he padded over to the drawers where his clothes were folded, and with an   
indignant glance toward the ceiling he pulled the top one open. The image of his   
squarely-arranged uniform brought back a bittersweet air and a smell of clean age.  
  
Damn.  
  
He -hated- parties.  
  
  
  
"I -love- parties!" Selphie cried, throwing a triumphant arm in the air.  
  
"Woah, now, Sephie," Irvine said, having narrowly missed being inadvertently struck in the face.   
With a careful hand he set his fingertips upon her raised fist and eased it back down. "Don't   
want to knock out anyone, here. They might stop the music over that one."  
  
"Wouldn't that be a shame," Quistis said dryly.  
  
Irvine, who was between the two women, grinned widely at her and set an arm across her shoulders.   
"Oh, Quisty." With his free hand he swept his hand across the hallway, where various students   
were heading toward the ballroom. "I know how hard it is -- these Garden parties are so drab!   
Everyone is wearing the same thing! Your keen fashion-sense is screaming, isn't it? Poor, poor   
girl."  
  
Quistis feigned a punch into his side. Sure enough, she was dressed in the skirt and suit-coat   
of a SeeD. The ensemble made her look uptight -- and she felt that way, too. Irvine, however,   
filled the Balamb uniform quite nicely. He grinned widely at the blonde, before turning to   
Selphie in order to shake his head tiredly. "Looks like my other date is getting feisty, here.   
Can't a man ever have a woman on both arms in peace?"  
  
He pushed the double-doors open and was immediately struck with a wave of noise. The music was   
classical and yet carried a quick beat -- something that got the blood pumping, Irvine thought   
pleasantly. The pleasantly warm room was filled with an array of navy-clad students, drinking   
and dancing in small clusters... mainly kids having fun.   
  
...And women, of course. Lots of them.  
  
"He's got that weird grin on his face again," Selphie said.   
  
Irvine, who had indeed been staring off at a group of the opposite sex for a few moments, was   
immediately pulled out of his temporary stupor by Selphie's voice. Like a spring he set an arm   
around her neck and rubbed his knuckles across the top of her head. Selphie, of course, erupted   
into a fit of giggles and beat against him with the resolve of a prisoner that didn't want to be   
released.  
  
Irvine, still wrestling with the girl, looked at Quistis over one shoulder. "Noogie?" He asked,   
as if he were offering a plate of ladyfingers.   
  
Quistis raised an index finger at him. "Touch my head and -die-."  
  
Irvine nodded a little, tasting the response like a wine. "...Fair enough." He finally said.  
  
Quistis, her lips pursed, nodded at him in a manner that said she was glad that they had reached   
an understanding. Irvine stuck his tongue out at her and released Selphie, who straightened   
dizzily. Irvine, blanching, quickly set to try and straighten her madly tousled hair with   
less-than-serious little pats, whistling innocently.  
  
"Stop it, stop! Stop it! Your fingers are getting caught! Irrvine!"  
  
"Guys!" A voice said at the same time. Zell, who had been... mingling, or something...lifted his   
hand above the camouflage of a small crowd and jogged toward the trio. Although he wore a uniform,  
his tattoo and wild-hair separated him from the masses... not to mention the way he moved. If   
the guy had one thing, it was atmosphere.  
  
"Zell." Quistis said flatly.   
  
Zell, looking surprised, peered at her with wide eyes. "Woah. Quistis, you aren't still bitter   
about yesterday, are you? How're the cuts doing, anyway? The gauze seems smaller, I can hardly   
notice it." Quistis rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest irritably.   
  
The spiky-haired blonde wet his lips and looked at the three of them. His mood, which had been   
forced enthusiasm, fell away to a much more natural demeanor -- apprehension and guilt.   
"Listen... Guys... If I would have known, if I had -any- idea... I would never had done this to   
you. You know that, don't you?"  
  
"Can't blame you for being stupid," Irvine said. Selphie elbowed him sharply in the side.  
  
Zell rubbed his forehead. "...and, well, I'll take the blame. I mean, I -am- taking the blame.   
None of you guys are going to get canned for it, alright?"  
  
"I don't want to be mad," Selphie said.  
  
Quistis and Irvine didn't say anything for a long while. Eventually, however, Irvine cleared his   
throat and said stiffly, "I don't want to spoil the party with this."  
  
"Let us help with the planning, next time," Quistis added. She seemed even stonier than Irvine,   
but the fact that she was actually talking was enough to lighten Zell's mood considerably --   
after all, this was Zell.  
  
However, he couldn't help but think to himself with some degree of shame weighing down on his   
heart... His grandfather would never had made this mistake.  
  
"Hey," He eventually said, cocking a thumb behind him. There was a table at the far end of the   
ballroom where the headmaster and his staff sat, drinking and talking. "Matron is over there...   
do you guys want to try talking to her?"  
  
Although Edea had been pardoned for what she had done, everyone still felt a little bit of   
apprehension when dealing with her. Their memories were faint... they knew that they loved her,   
or that they at least were -supposed- to love her, but it took effort sometimes to stand by her   
side as a friend rather than a threat.  
  
Cid had been watching them from across the room, and he raised a glass of champagne in silent   
greeting. Irvine made a tipping-of the hat motion, Selphie twiddled her fingertips, and Quistis   
nodded formally. Zell, however, who was facing the other direction, saw Squall enter the ballroom   
doors (he was late, imagine that) and waved madly at him. Squall met his enthusiasm with a   
raised eyebrow and a slow saunter in their direction.  
  
"And the prince has arrived," Zell declared.  
  
He didn't quite know just how close to the truth he was. At the moment the doors fell to a shut   
behind them there was a definite clang of a spoon against the side of a glass, and everyone in   
the room turned to look at the long table where the staff had seated. Cid Kramer was standing,   
looking as old and weary as he was... but there was no doubting the definite twinkle in his   
eyes.  
  
Squall, who had fallen into step just behind Selphie, raised his head with a glistening swing of   
his hair and narrowed his eyes curiously. A quick glance to the rest proved that they knew as   
little as he did.  
  
"Excuse me," Cid said, although he clearly had everyone's attention. "Before we start the   
festivities tonight, I'd like to make a few announcements. As most of you know, this party has   
a reason beyond the reconstruction of Balamb Garden." And, with that, the man motioned toward   
the five SeeDs that were standing in a cluster near the doors.  
  
No. Oh, no. Squall could feel eyes on him. A pain rushed from his stomach into his throat, and   
if he weren't so set in stone by his sense of duty and discipline, he would have been shoving   
his way outside at that very moment.   
  
"These five members of this establishment that are with us today have done something that I   
cannot properly remember anyone else doing in the history of our time. Not only have they saved   
this Garden from certain demise, but they also have put their wondrous abilities into saving our   
world from ending as we know it."  
  
It was so quiet. It was so goddamned quiet. Everyone was staring at them. Squall bored his eyes   
intensely into Cid as he talked, trying to force him to stop... If the man had dropped into coma   
right there, Squall would have almost jumped up clapped his heels together with relief. However,   
Cid did not stop -- he even went as far as to look over at Squall and wink. -Wink-!   
  
Damn him.  
  
"There is little that I can offer them, or, at least, nothing that can possibly reward them for   
what they had done. As a SeeD, your life is contracted to your mission... but this was a   
mission that no normal soldier could have pulled off, duty aside." Cid paused and adjusted his   
glasses a little. The hand that had been holding his glass in the manner of a toast lowered it   
to the table.  
  
"Quistis Trepe, if you'd come up here for a moment."  
  
Squall wasn't looking, but he heard Quistis stir and then saw her in his plane of vision as she   
moved across the room with a poise that he could never have. She looked almost as if she were   
expecting this. Eventually she made it to Cid's side. First she shook his hand, and then   
Edea's--how ironic, Squall couldn't help but think.   
  
"Quistis, I'm aware that you have given up your Instructor's license..."  
  
Next to him, Squall heard Zell huff out a little, "Wha?" It acted as a reminder to his stricken   
mind, and then he realized what the man was confused about -- Quistis had told them that her   
license had been taken away from her. But then, when Squall thought about it... Poor leadership?   
Quistis? It was a lie so absurd that he was almost ashamed for having believed it.  
  
Quistis was playing with the hair that covered the most of her wrapped jaw, as if she knew full   
well that they were all looking at her curiously. However, she did not glance their way, and   
with a nod she listened to Cid continue with formal grace.   
  
"However, in the wake of these events, I would like to renew it." Cid went on for a long while,   
explaining Quistis's strong points and her history with the garden, as well as how beneficial   
she would be to the Garden during these new times. Quistis listened on modestly, and with a nod   
she accepted the offer with a second handshake and a little nod to the applause that broke out   
within the room.  
  
"Selphie Tilmitt, would you please step foreward?"  
  
She brushed past him as she went up to join Quistis. That natural bounce in her step had all but   
died, and she glanced about warily. Again, she shared her greetings with Cid and Edea, and to   
Squall's dull shock she was given the same offer and history-based speech. Selphie? She would be   
almost as bad as Zell when it came to this, if not worse. It just wasn't in her nature.  
  
And yet, with all that she had been through... What better person could instruct future   
soldiers? Her bravery in the face of Trabia's potential and then definite destruction was not   
lost on him. They all had learned so much.  
  
"Irvine Kinneas, if you'd please?"  
  
Squall, who was slowly beginning to wear out of his horror, lowered his head a little and rubbed   
at the bridge of his nose irritably. Ceremonies. What a horrid, horrid thing... A crucifixion   
would have been more pleasant.   
  
"Oh man, oh man..." Zell was saying. He'd been saying it ever since Irvine was called. Squall   
had been ignoring him, but eventually it wore on his nerves until he looked over and snapped out a,  
  
"What?"  
  
"Oh man," Zell said again, for good measure. "They aren't going to call me."  
  
"What?"  
  
"After what I did... Would you let me teach students after that? I mean, I'd probably just take   
them out onto the field and get them killed." Squall held his tongue, and tactfully so. Zell,   
oblivious, went on with his tirade. "Cid's never going to make me an instructor!"  
  
"...I thought that you didn't want to be chained to a faculty?"  
  
Zell stumbled. "Uh-wha, well, that was yesterday. This is today. I'm not getting any older, you   
know."  
  
"Younger?"  
  
"Yeah. That's what I said."  
  
Squall sighed drearily.  
  
"God," Zell said. "It's going to be so embarrassing. I mean, they're going to call all of you   
guys up, tell you how great you are, and then everyone is gonna be like, hey, wait? Who's that   
dumb blonde guy over there? Why didn't they call on him? He must be some moron. I bet he--"  
  
"Zell Dincht."  
  
Zell's eyes bugged out and his head whirled. Sure enough, Cid was looking at him expectantly.   
His heart rushed, and with that he did a little leap where he stood. "Me? Did you just   
cal--Woo!!" And, with everyone at the table looking at him wearily, he threw victory punches in   
the air and hooted out a, "Booyaaa!" and went running excitedly across the room.  
  
Cid tugged at his collar and delivered his speech to a very twittery Zell.  
  
Squall's chest increasingly filled with dread as Cid went on. He would be next, assuredly. His   
arms crossed uncomfortably over his chest and he cast wary glances around where he stood, meeting   
the eyes of the students who were staring in his direction. He hated this. Words couldn't   
describe how much he hated this.  
  
"Now, Squall doesn't like me to talk about him," Cid said all of a sudden, breaking into that   
coy and playful little smile of his when Squall looked up at him. The man was irritated, his   
eyes were burning, but Cid met it with a bright, chipper tone. With his free hand he crooked a   
finger and beckoned him over. Squall, who was gritting his teeth by then and flaming inwardly,   
shifted his hips and stalked toward Cid and his friends, who were watching him with a mixture of   
sympathy and amusement. Amusement, namely.  
  
When Squall got to the table, Cid set a hand on his shoulder for a moment and continued. "So   
I'll go easy on him. In fact, I'll hardly talk about him at all... rather, I'll talk about myself."  
  
This was when the dread began to wane and panic broke in.  
  
"The Garden was a dream of mine, something that I have worked for ages to mold and create in its   
image. We have met our purpose, reached the pinnacle of our existence... but this does not mean   
that the story is over. In the course of human nature there will be many more reasons for the   
Garden to be of use... and we must keep it running in preparation for those very events."  
  
"However, I will not live forever. I'm getting older, and this past war has exposed all of the   
cracks in my leadership and put light on all of the steel in Squall's. This man, over all else,   
has single-handedly led usto the victories that we have earned. It is only right that I give my   
power to the one who most deserves it--"  
  
No. No-no-no!  
  
"Squall, you have acted as the leader of this school during the most treacherous times that we   
have ever seen -- and I think that it is about time that I formally hand my position over to   
you. It is a position that you have filled for quite a while."  
  
Everyone was staring at him. And then they were clapping, cheering. At his side he watched Zell   
jump up in the air a few times, and then he saw Edea's proud smile. His embarrassment was so   
great that he was getting dizzy with it. Over that, however, was intense fury. Cid knew him, Cid  
had always boasted of knowing him...  
  
...It should have been obvious that he didn't want this!  
  
Squall held up his hand to the noise. It sickened him that everyone immediately silenced. Cid was   
looking over at him bemusedly, but when Squall's lips parted he suddenly grew nervous. Squall   
wasn't going to give an appreciation speech, that was for sure.  
  
"T-thank you," Squall said. His voice cracked a little, and with a swallow he tried to build up   
enough strength to speak clearly, like the leader that they wanted. "It is a great h..honor that   
I am considered so deserving for this job. However, I did -not- lead us to victory. Our success   
was the result of a combination of efforts, teamwork. The abilities that I lacked were made up   
by the people who fought by my side, and that includes all of you who had participated in the war."  
  
Everyone stared at him. It was rare to hear more than one sentence from the man. Squall knew   
that he had been gifted with some sort of charisma, a way of speaking like a leader when he was  
forced to, a way of making people feel safe in confident... but during times like these, it was   
a trait that he didn't want.  
  
"I've made a lot of mistakes, and I've done a lot of foolish things. However, I refuse to make a   
mistake tonight. I may have been lucky, and I may have seemed skilled... but those were at   
desperate times, times of war, and there are still a lot of things that I have to learn about   
running a Garden."  
  
It was lucky that he didn't have a microphone. The pausing breath that Squall took rattled with   
enough nervousness to knock down a brick wall. Only those who were close to him realized just   
how terrified he was, and they glanced over at him warily.  
  
"There is only one person who has forged the war with that experience. She taught me everything   
that I know." Swallowing back the lump in his throat, he motioned with a hand. "Quistis?"   
  
The blonde looked at him for a moment, and in her eyes was a look that he knew all too well...   
It was the look that she had given him when she stood over him in the infirmary after he had   
snuck out to battle with Seifer, ever so long ago...  
  
She understood him. She knew that he was weaseling out of this at her expense. His words may   
have been sweet, they may have even been true... but they were also excuses.  
  
She continued to give him that look for three entire heartbeats, and then with a gracious and   
formal raise of her chin she stepped forward and out of the haphazard line that they had formed.   
Everyone was quiet, and Squall, sick to his stomach still, lifted his hands and clapped them   
together. For a moment it was only him, and then everyone else filled in the empty spaces in the   
room.  
  
Cid closed his eyes with acceptance, shook his head a little in silent humor, and put his   
applause in with the rest.  
  
  
  
"That was a mean thing that you did, Squall."  
  
An hour had passed, and the earlier events were swept away with the one-two-three of spinning   
waltzes. It was the way of a ceremony... brilliant and worthy of awe at the moment, but only for   
that moment. People had even stopped staring at him for the most part.  
  
He was on the floor with Quistis, moving with practiced ease. At first they had tried to have   
fun with it, practicing dips and twirls, but eventually they simply swayed with the beat, his   
hand at her waist and hers on his shoulder, clasping each-other's palms with casual ease. It   
was easier to talk this way -- and Squall thought that Quistis deserved this conversation.   
  
"...I'm sorry that I put you on the spot," He admitted. "But what I said was true. I can't be a   
leader, Quistis--"  
  
The woman snorted.  
  
"I can't." Squall said, more softly this time. A year ago, and he would have simply stopped   
talking to her right then in frustration. But after their adventures, Rinoa... he was now able   
to iterate a thought. "Doing what you have to do during times of war, that's one thing... but   
everyday things? I wouldn't know what to do with myself."  
  
Quistis shrugged a little, putting a tiny and dry smile on her face. "Maybe. But you better damn   
well be there for me to get advice from, if war comes about."  
  
"Of course. Being Headmaster doesn't mean that you're in total control..."  
  
"...Exactly." Quistis said smugly, pulling him into her trap. "Why are you afraid of it, then?"   
Squall, however, did not seem to be amused by her response, and his more laid-back...for him, at   
least...demeanor was torn apart by a tight-lipped frown.  
  
"Look," She said. "I'm sorry. I'm just... curious."  
  
"Maybe I'm a little dissatisfied right now." Squall said. "With the Garden, SeeD..."  
  
"Because Rinoa doesn't seem very interested in it?"  
  
Another frown. They shifted a bit and started moving across the floor a little, on account that  
the music was picking up. Both were attuned enough to keep intensely in their conversation, even   
though Squall didn't like the way that it was going. He didn't like talking about himself like   
this.  
  
"...Maybe. I don't know." Squall said.  
  
Quistis looked up at him and cocked an eyebrow, as if she didn't believe him, but yet she   
adjusted her expression and changed the subject with a flickering gaze down to their clasped   
hands. "...How are they?"  
  
"These?" He touched her delicately, and she him... but even with that precaution his wounded   
palms hurt, although he did not burden Quistis with this information. "They're fine. What about   
you, though? What do you think, a week more?" His hand left hers and he brushed her hair from   
her face a little to touch the corner of her bandage.  
  
"Oh," Quistis put her hand to it awkwardly and averted her eyes. "I hope so. The marks won't go   
away, though..." She looked troubled by this for a moment, but then she looked over at Squall   
with sadly bemused eyes. "We'll be like twins."  
  
"We can be scar buddies," Squall added.  
  
Quistis stopped for a moment and looked at him oddly, as if she couldn't believe the words that   
had come out of his mouth. And then, after that moment of shock, she threw her head back and   
laughed.   
  
"What?"  
  
"...Nothing." Quistis said. She covered her mouth for a moment and swallowed back her mirth.   
Taking his hands again, they danced silently as the song wore on, although there was still a   
little bit of that warmth in her eyes.  
  
Squall seemed absentminded, however, and the silence gave his eyes an excuse to wander. Quistis   
watched his face for a while, and then their feet... and when she looked at his profile again,   
her gaze was serious and a little solemn.  
  
"It's strange for you, with Rinoa not being here, isn't it?"  
  
"...I guess. I don't know."  
  
She brushed a strand of hair away from her eyes and looked over at the band for a moment, which   
was reaching its crescendo. "I remember when she was here, before you were sent to Timber. She   
managed to woo you right onto the dance floor..."  
  
Something dropped in Squall's chest. Oddly, it seemed to have never hit bottom. Slowly he looked   
down on her, with an expression that sent shivers down her spine. "...What?" He said after that   
immeasurable pause.  
  
"The garden party, after you became a SeeD. Remember?"  
  
"I..." Squall paused. "Yes. A little... I..." His eyes narrowed and blinked, and he looked over   
one shoulder, as if he were trying to pull something out of the scenery around him. "Maybe. I..."  
  
Quistis stared up at him. The song was still going, but they had stopped in the middle of the   
floor, their arms had dropped and they stood like two pillars in the middle of the melee, frozen   
uncomfortably in time.  
  
"Quistis.. I don't remember how we met. I don't remember when Rinoa and I first met..."  
  
  
  
  
End Part 10/?  
To Be Continued.  
  
  
  
*"Scar Buddies" was taken from a -hilarious- humor   
story titled "Final Fantasy VIII In A Nutshell" by   
Sita Atis. I couldn't help but take the opportunity  
to use it when the subject came up. Be sure and read   
the story if you have the time. You won't regret it! ^-^  
  
  
  
  
  



	12. Part Eleven

"Bleeding is believing  
You're hiding  
Underneath the smoke   
In the room..."  
--Natalie Imbruglia  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part XI  
  
  
Barbs had a way of burrowing further and further into the skin.   
  
Squall, upon his initial realization, had gone further and further into a frenzy -- at least as   
far as his friends could tell. Naturally, the crowd only picked up a less-comfortable man on the   
dance floor, wandering around the tables, toward the door. His companions and teammates,   
however, saw a panic that rushed beneath the surface. Beneath Squall's stoicism was a raging   
storm, and his mind visibly twittered.  
  
Eventually, with Quistis's mindful help, the five of them gathered in Squall's dorm room. It was   
crowded, and the tension coming from the man made it all the more uncomfortable. Selphie   
nervously stood against the wall and Squall was almost pushed into a seated position on the   
bed. Irvine sat down next to him, and Zell unabashedly perched on top of a box-cupboard.   
  
"Okay?" He said. "Tell me why Squall's dorm is better than a party?"  
  
Squall was too out of it to even properly give Zell a glance, and the blonde man immediately   
quieted. The lack of acknowledgement was almost more impacting than a glare would have been.  
  
"When did Rinoa come around?" Quistis asked.  
  
"In Timber," Zell said, as if this were the most obvious thing in the world. Selphie nodded and   
Irvine could only shrug, naturally.   
  
Squall didn't say anything, but his hand slid up past his forehead and he took his hair into a   
painful grip. Selphie winced a little from the sight of it. "It's all a blank," Squall said.   
"...I never realized it until now... I can't..."  
  
"Think back," Quistis urged.  
  
"We went through this already," Squall said. However, his eyes still moved downward in a way   
that suggested that he was trying to do what she asked. "She was worried about Seifer... did   
she try to...?"  
  
"...And we had a contract, I had to...protect...her?"  
  
Everyone was either watching him blankly or shaking their head no. Squall pursed his lips and   
set his teeth a little, but before he could speak again Quistis said, "You were hired to help a   
small resistance group called the Forest Owls, which Rinoa was a part of. But I could have   
sworn that she was at your graduation ball."  
  
Squall put a hand over his mouth.  
  
"Wait," Irvine said. "I..."  
  
Everyone looked at him.   
  
"Nevermind," He said.  
  
"Well," Selphie finally said, "Squall's stressed. I mean, the Headmaster--I mean, Cid--really   
did a number on you tonight, you know?" She shifted around against the wall and eventually   
walked over toward where Zell was, as if she were having trouble standing still. As if she were   
bored... but that was understandable.  
  
How could she possibly have known what was going through Squall's mind?  
  
"Sephie's right," Zell added. "I mean, we can't fret over a little bout of amnesia, you know.   
It's not like you forgot your name and who you are, Squall."  
  
"What about the SeeD exam?" Quistis asked. "Forget about Rinoa for a moment--"  
  
"No problem with that," Zell quipped. He got a round of glares and shrugged. "-I- thought it was   
funny. Sue me."  
  
"I had put off my Guardian Force exam until the last minute," Squall said.   
  
"...And then?"  
  
"I'd gotten in a fight with Seifer that day."  
  
"Where did you go for your field exam?" Quistis asked.  
  
"..."  
  
"Squall?"  
  
"...I was with Selphie and Seifer," Squall said.  
  
"--And me!" Zell interjected.  
  
"...But I..." Squall lowered his head again and rubbed between his eyes. "I can...see it,   
but... It's like Rinoa. It's foggy, I can't trust it. Quistis, I..."  
  
"You were with me, too!" Zell said.  
  
Quistis' eyebrows knitted, and she exchanged a look with Irvine, who could only shrug again.   
"I don't get it," She finally said.  
  
"Neither do I," Irvine shifted his weight so that he was leaning back on one hand, and used the   
other to add a dimension of gestures to his words. "I mean, you'd think a guy would -know- when   
stuff like that is missing."  
  
"Not until you realize that it's gone," Quistis said.  
  
"This isn't a grocery list that we're talking about, Quisty."  
  
"I'm sorry," Squall muttered, cutting off Quistis before she could retort. "This isn't your   
problem. I shouldn't be burdening you guys with this... maybe I -am- just stressed out."  
  
"Squall," Quistis said. "This is a big deal. We need to get you to the..." She paused for a   
moment. "...Infirmary..." She looked at Irvine again, and then at Zell and Selphie, who seemed   
temporarily uninvolved and stooped over something. "...or something." She finished.   
  
"Like a hypnotist!" Zell cried.  
  
(She said something about not letting other girls hypnotize you into dancing with them or   
something? What's up with that, Squall?)  
  
For a moment a thought slipped into Squall's head, but before his consciousness could dig its   
claws into it he found the memory slipping away, teasing him with its presence. It had happened   
so many times during the night... and was almost as frightening as a lack of any memory at all.   
  
"I..." Squall started.  
  
"Hey," Selphie cut in. She had turned around with a bounce of her brown hair, and in both hands   
was an open book. It was relatively thin and leather-bound... old but almost new-looking all   
the same. Squall immediately recognized it as the book that Rinoa had been looking at two   
evenings before. He narrowed his eyes curiously.  
  
"What is it?" Quistis asked. Zell, who was closest to Selphie, leaned over a little and peered   
down at the text. "Hey," He said. "It's.. hey, it's a journal!"  
  
"What? Why do I have it?" Squall asked. Irvine had sat bolt upright at the word, and before   
Squall could get a look at his face he was up on his feet and moving toward Selphie and the   
book. Quistis too found herself going that way.   
  
"It's yours," Selphie said. There was something thicker beneath her voice.  
  
"What?" Squall said incredulously. "It's not -mine-. I've never had a journal. I've never seen   
that book before in my life." Even though he didn't want to stir, he still found himself   
standing, although he didn't move toward the cluster around Selphie.  
  
"It's your handwriting," She said.  
  
"It can't be mine."  
  
"Who else would write about getting his gunblade polished?" Zell said, putting a little smirk on  
his face. He pulled the book out of Selphie's hands and held it up to his face. "Boor-ing," He   
said. Putting his fingers up, he pretended to adjust a pair of glasses. "Let's see... anything   
juicy?"  
  
"It's not mine!" Squall snapped. But as Zell began to read his anger waned into frustration, and   
his frustration shifted into confusion. They were namely appointments, a few thoughts... but   
they were his words, he slowly realized. But he didn't remember writing any of them.  
  
"The Seventh: If I get asked to be on that goddamned committee -one- more time--" Zell started   
dramatically. Squall, by then, had gotten himself moving, and with a quick motion he snatched   
the book out of Zell's hold and closed it in one palm with a firm snap.  
  
"Sheesh, man, I was just kidding," Zell said. Selphie scratched at the side of her head   
uncomfortably and glanced about.  
  
"This doesn't make sense," Squall said. "Forgetting things, writing things without -knowing-   
it... it's insane." He didn't mean that lightly. What was -wrong- with him?  
  
"No." Irvine said firmly. Everyone looked over at him. "Guys... don't you remember?"  
  
  
  
"Keep watching me  
Too slow--  
And you're left wanting  
Wanting me, our love  
And everything that we were  
Once upon a time  
Our youth kept us flying  
But in this growing age  
We'll see just how far we've fallen..."  
  
The text was written in scrawly, rushed handwriting... as if someone were jotting it down in   
fear that she would forget what she was thinking before the thought was fully captured in ink.   
And this was only a small piece of a clustered whole. In the book was a series of poetry, lyrics,   
and notes marked in pen.  
  
Songs. Hundreds of them.  
  
Rinoa ran her hand across the written stanza tenderly. The paper was rough, thick, like a   
scrapbook... but there was no warmth, no comfort in that touch. It itched at her fingertips and   
tickled like a cat's tongue... but there was no magic there.  
  
Her mother had written these. All of them.  
  
Rinoa looked down at the songbook in dull, quiet awe. A small, warm light in the corner and the   
shadows that it created made everything seem more and more magical in her cozy bedroom... Or at   
least it was -supposed- to be magical.  
  
Why couldn't she feel anything?  
  
This was her history, her past... a piece of Julia Heartilly that she could finally touch. And   
touch it she did, as if she could never get enough of it. The book must have taken years to fill   
up, and there were only a few pages left blank. The stanza that she had read was the start of   
another song among many, but it had never been finished.  
  
Had her mother lost interest in the piece? Had she died before she could complete it?  
  
And still, in her sadness and desperation... yes, she could touch it and she did, but something   
in her heart didn't let her feel anything. Eventually, after a long time looking at that   
half-finished song, Rinoa set her fingers upon the cover and slowly closed the book. The small   
writing desk seemed empty all of a sudden.   
  
"What does this mean?" She had asked Laguna Loire when she first set her eyes upon it, when she   
first realized that this had been her mothers, that she was looking onto her mother's handwriting,  
her mother's thoughts, her mother's songs...  
  
A knock on the door tore her from her thoughts. Her freshly-brushed hair slipped down and around   
her shoulder as she turned her head in that direction, setting her feet flat and pushing back   
against the chair. "Yes?"  
  
She sounded so regal, so on top of things.  
  
"Miss Heartilly?" A familiar voice said. And before she could even acknowledge him Iskyua poked   
his head through the door with a fresh-scrubbed look on his face that held his natural smile,   
although his lips hardly curved. "Sorry to disturb you, but you wanted me to fetch you--" He   
jabbed a thumb toward a clock on the wall. "The satellite is at a hundred-and-ten percent..."  
  
"Well, actually," He said with a grin, "That's impossible, having over a hundred percent and   
all, but it's fully charged, anyway. We told Balamb that we would try again at this time,   
remember? We'd better jet off to the radio and get you up and running."  
  
Rinoa had forgotten--no, actually, she hadn't, but she had certainly lost track of time. Smiling   
with a warmth that she didn't feel--she was getting good at that--she moved to get to her feet.   
Iskuya, meanwhile, stepped into the room and pulled her jacket off the bed in order to hand it   
to her.   
  
Only when her fingers left the rough cover of the songbook did she realize that she had been   
touching it for the entire conversation.  
  
  
  
"I can't believe that we all forgot!" Quistis said.  
  
"But it makes sense, doesn't it?" Irvine said, looking at all of them with a wide, post-shock   
look in his eyes. "I mean... if the Guardian Forces steal our memories, wouldn't they steal the   
memories that -involve- them?"  
  
"...Heh. You mean they actually chart-and-analyze what parts of the past they want to erase?"   
Zell huffed.  
  
"I don't know about you," Selphie said, "But if I were a Guardian Force, I'd want to get rid of   
the stuff that would be threatening to me, you know? I mean... it's only natural. If we know   
what they do to us, then we'd be more able to defend ourselves. By taking away our awareness,   
they're covering their butts."  
  
"Covering their butts," Quistis said. "Cute."  
  
"Thanks."  
  
"Anyway," Irvine said. "When we mentioned Guardian Forces, it started to make me think... and   
when Selphie mentioned the -journal-..." He let out a low whistle. "I have one. It's under my   
bed."  
  
"Me too," Selphie said. "Only I keep it in my bottom drawer."  
  
Both Zell and Quistis nodded.  
  
Squall forced himself to bob his head as well, although inwardly he was growing more and more   
terrified. At the moment when Irvine started to explain, everyone jumped to join him. It was as   
if their memories were instantaneously returned...  
  
But he was still at a loss. Things were starting to make sense, sure... but the fog remained.  
  
"How long do you think it's been like this?" Zell asked.  
  
"I don't know," Quistis admitted.  
  
"It goes with how much we use them, right? That's what we had decided." Irvine said. "Remember?   
And Ultimecia... Think about it, guys..."  
  
"We totally did a number on ourselves," Selphie said. "After fighting we forgot all about   
everything and didn't even realize it!"  
  
"I don't like this," Quistis said.  
  
Me either, Squall thought.  
  
"Tell me about it," Irvine said. "But what can we do?"  
  
There was the sound of a door opening from the front room of Squall's dorm. Everyone cast a   
dismissive glance that way and saw Xu walk apprehensively over to the open bedroom entranceway   
and set her hand upon the doorframe. She looked at them all, and they returned her gaze in turn.  
  
"Squall," She said. With a shift of her head she motioned toward the hallway. Squall nodded in   
unspoken response to the equally silent reminder.   
  
"I don't want these things inside me." Quistis said. "We aren't fighting anymore and... Guys, we   
all -forgot- things that had happened not even a year ago. Doesn't that bother you? Sure, we put   
up with it earlier because we -had- to, but now..."  
  
Irvine looked down at his feet. Selphie looked at Zell, and then at Xu, who obviously was only   
partially clear as to what was going on... although there was not a trace of confusion on her   
professional, calm face.  
  
"...We have to get rid of them," Squall said.  
  
  
  
"Squall," Xu said. They had stepped off the elevator and into Cid's office. He had explained   
what he could on the trip over, and her face became bleaker and bleaker. She didn't look like   
she wanted to speak when she did... but obviously seemed to feel that she had no choice   
otherwise. "The process of junctioning Guardian Forces to humans is...new to us. Guardian Forces   
as a -whole- are relatively new."  
  
Squall had stopped when she spoke, and looked at her with expressionless eyes. She seemed to   
crumple under that gaze and urged them to keep moving. "We knew that they affected memories, but   
have seldom had impacting cases--"  
  
"--Because no one is able to remember that they've forgotten anything."  
  
Again, she wiltered. "The thing is, Squall... We're still learning a lot. We don't know how they   
steal your memories, or why, or if we can get them back. We don't know why we're able to junction   
them to a person, or how someone is more compatible than someone else. We have -ideas-, sure...   
but everything is still pretty new, and we're learning as we go along..."  
  
They had come to a halt at Cid's desk, and Xu took that moment to look up at him regretfully. "I   
guess what I'm trying to say is... if you want to try and get them out of your system, I'll be   
behind you."   
  
"You're saying that they may be less safe than you first assumed?" Squall said.  
  
"No." Xu retorted. "I'm not saying that."  
  
But she didn't go on to explain. Rather, she pointed to the radio set that was set up on the   
desk and then to the chair in front of it. "It's on," She said. "If everything works alright on   
the other end, you should be opening the transmission in a few moments. I'll leave you alone here,  
if you'd like. It's basic equipment."  
  
"Go back to my dorm," Squall said. "You know the most in this Garden when it comes to Guardian  
Forces. Whatever that may be, be it a little or a lot, it's more than what we have. Talk with the   
rest of them, try and figure something out. I'll be down in a while."  
  
"Yes sir," Xu said. When Squall looked at her, she smiled a little, but it was listless. With   
that, she turned and walked to the doors. A moment later, and Squall was the only one in the   
spacious, quiet room.  
  
The clock told him that he had only a minute before the transmission was supposed to come in.   
The time felt like an eternity, and Squall was tapping his fingers and looking out the window   
when the radio first hissed. The sound was loud enough to make him jump up in his seat.   
Wide-eyed, he looked about the room... but there was, of course, no one there to see that he had   
been startled.  
  
"Hello?" He said, feeling foolish. It felt as if he was talking to himself...and the electric   
crackle of the microphone didn't help him out by producing a reply. "...Testing?" He tried,   
giving it a second go.  
  
"Squall?" The voice came just when he was getting worried.  
  
"Rinoa?"  
  
"You sound so far away!"  
  
"...I am far away."   
  
There was a rush of air, a rattling hiss that burned in his ears. From that he realized that   
Rinoa must have pushed out a laughter-laced breath. "Thanks for telling me," She said. "I'm glad   
you did it before I started walking over to see you."  
  
"You wouldn't get very far," Squall said.  
  
He could almost feel her smile. "I'll be getting on the train in the morning."  
  
"Uh-huh." Suddenly the conversation felt trivial, trite. There was so much weighing on his   
mind... It felt like old times again. How could he possibly talk about what he was feeling? Gee,   
Rinoa, you've got something living in your head that's slowly eating away at your memories? How   
much did the train ticket cost, by the way?  
  
Rinoa was apparently thinking along the same line, for she had allowed the pause to linger,   
before asking in a much more solemn tone. "Squall, do you remember your mother at all?"  
  
She couldn't have had worse timing. "I was taken in by the Garden when I was a kid, I've told   
you that. I've never really had parents." He tried to hide the stiffness from his voice.  
  
"Oh." He could almost see her twisting her foot a little, maybe playing with the handle of her   
microphone. Fidgeting. It was something that she did when she had something important weighing   
on her mind. "Squall, Laguna gave me something tonight..."  
  
Squall's eyes shifted toward the clock. Did they have five minutes to talk, or ten? He couldn't   
remember. "Yeah," He said absentmindedly while he thought this to himself.  
  
"...It was a songbook that my mother had written. I guess I never thought about it before...   
but Squall... I've just been feeling so -lost- ever since I'd gotten it. I mean, I've been   
trying so hard to think back on her... but I can't. Squall, I can't bring up an image of her   
face, her voice... not even the -feelings- that I had about her." Her voice cracked. "Squall, I   
can't even remember her dying, I can't remember anything about it."  
  
"...I know." Squall said.  
  
"What do you mean, you know?" Rinoa asked. She sounded irritated all of a sudden. "Are you even   
listening to me?"  
  
"Yeah," Squall said. He had been tense before, but the hands on the clock drove him a little,   
so that his voice moved faster than he wanted it to. He felt like a metronome on high. "I can't   
talk about it now though, Rinoa, we don't have much time," And before she could reply, he added   
without a skip in his beat, "Look, could you do me a favor?"  
  
Not a sound came from her end. Squall paused long enough to listen, looked at the clock again,   
and continued on, "I need you to talk to Doctor Odine. This is very important." He said the   
latter slowly, as if afraid that the radio would scuffle his words. "I need you to get all the   
information that you can on Guardian Forces. I've got to know about removing them, and what   
effects they have on the mind. Can you do that, Rinoa?"  
  
Silence. "Rinoa?"  
  
"...Yeah." She finally said. Her voice was flat.  
  
"Can you do that for me?"  
  
"Whatever." She said.  
  
"Thanks. I can't say how important this is to me. I'll talk to you tomorrow, alright? ...I miss   
you." Only when he finished his sentence did he realize that everything had gone dead on Rinoa's   
end of the transmission. She'd turned off her radio.  
  
The minute hand clicked into place, and the official connection severed.  
  
  
  
  
End Part 11/?  
To Be Continued...  



	13. Part Twelve

"Blank page  
Was all the rage  
Never meant to say anything..."  
--Smashing Pumpkins  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part XII  
  
  
How dare he!  
  
It had been so important to her, what she had tried to tell him over the radio transmission.   
Sitting there in that room, she had wanted only someone to talk to, someone to listen to what   
she had to say... anything! But rather, she was being sent off to do the man's homework. Even   
after a night's sleep, Rinoa still felt enraged. She refused to buy a ticket for the early train   
as she had first planned, and it was not until later that morning when she finally set out into   
the city.  
  
At first, in her anger, she had decided to ignore what Squall had asked her, but time and careful   
thought told her to do otherwise. She may had been furious--insulted, rather, that was a much   
better word--but she had to trust his priorities, no matter how insensitive he had been in   
displaying them.  
  
Ooh! How -dare- he!  
  
She walked down the open corridor that led to Odine's laboratory. The view was spectacular, but   
she hardly gave it a glance. The guards recognized her from her earlier adventures and let her   
pass...  
  
...afraid of her, perhaps?  
  
Damn them, too.  
  
Odine's lab was a whirlwind of activity and noise. The strange old man was huddled over a   
computer monitor and talking to it wildly when she stepped into the room. Rinoa, silent, stepped   
off to one side when the door hissed to a close behind her.   
  
"Leezen to me, you damnable thing! I didn't type thees! Why are you telling me that I typed   
thees! I didn't, do you hear me? No-no!" He waved his arms around and pounded on the screen. The   
machine hissed back at him angrily.  
  
It was then when he first took note of Rinoa. He caught a glimpse of her over one shoulder and   
turned his head with surprise, before whirling his body to face her. "You! It iz you!" As if   
this were the most spectacular and yet horrific thing in the world. Rinoa crumpled, trying to   
resist the urge to hide in her coat.   
  
She had done such an evil, evil thing... would the world ever let that go?  
  
"Look, doctor," She said, getting straight to the point. She hated the way that he looked at   
her and suddenly wished that she hadn't decided to listen to Squall after all. "I have an   
important request from Balamb Garden. They need information on Guardian Forces."  
  
"Oh?" He still eyed her, but at her comment he ruffled a little. "Iz thees for personal use? My   
information iz very classified, you zee. I can't just throw it out to everyone."  
  
Rinoa tried not to roll her eyes. "Yes," She said. "As I've said, it's very important and to be   
used in Balamb only -- if you'd like, I could bring President Loire down here to further stress   
the argument."  
  
"No, no," Odine twittered at the pointedness in her tone. "Thees iz not necessary." He leaned   
over towards her with a little twirl of his hips and looked her in the eyes. "Vat iz it that you   
want to know?"  
  
Rinoa shifted her eyes off to one side and scratched at the side of her head a little. "Well..."   
Damn it. If Squall was going to be a selfish jerk, he may as well have gone all the way and   
given her a little more to work with. "Could you maybe send a transmission? Can I bring anything   
back with me to Balamb?"  
  
Odine's eyes bugged out and he flew up in shock, as if she had just stated a great blasphemy.   
"No! Oh, no! Zee airwaves are -very- untrustworthy! And giving you a hard copy? Awk! Thees iz   
my life work!"  
  
"What if it were urgent?" Rinoa asked.  
  
"Iz it?"  
  
She paused. That was enough for Odine, who shook his finger at her in the manner of a scolding   
parent who had caught her in the middle of a guilty act. "I zee." He said flatly.  
  
She rubbed irritably at the bridge of her nose. "Tell me about the Guardian Forces."  
  
"Vat about them?"  
  
"Well, what have you learned about how they work? About their effect on memory?"  
  
"Well," Odine said. He stretched his back, which made Rinoa worry over the fact that this was to   
be a long explanation. For a moment the strange man padded in little circles on the steel floor   
of his laboratory, and after a few rounds he began to speak while doing so, "You zee, Guardian   
Forces can be junctioned into a human--"  
  
"I know that already," Rinoa interrupted. Odine immediately cast her a red-rimmed glare for   
speaking up. Rinoa's lips tightened in a hidden grimace, and she pulled back warily. The   
scientist continued to glare at her for a moment, and then he went on with forced hesitation,   
as if purposely slowing himself in order to punish her. "Guardian Forces can be junctioned into   
a human, you zee. They go in zere." He tapped at his temple. "However, they do not take up space   
in zee mind, oh-no... Rather, they control it."  
  
"...Control it?"  
  
"If you would let me finish."  
  
"Sorry."  
  
"Imagine tiny lizzle claws--"  
  
"Lizzle?"  
  
"Lizzle. Small."  
  
"Oh."  
  
"Tiny lizzle claws, digging into zee memory, zee very -being- of a person." Odine nodded   
empathetically, his eyes gleaming a little with the excitement over anything that was unique to   
him. "They fuse together, become one. Zee Guardian Forces' consciousness becomes zee human's   
consciousness. It is like having two minds in one--and it leaves less room for zee storage   
space," He chortled a little. "Storage space, iz'nt that cute? I made thees up myself. It's   
another way of saying, 'memory storage.'"  
  
"I know, I know." Rinoa said. "So you're telling me that it's not the use of Guardian Forces,   
but their -existence- that affects a person? Just by being in your head?"  
  
"Yes. Therefore, zee Guardian Force replaces some of the memories, and they take up more and   
more as they get bigger and bigger, you zee?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"It iz quite fascinating, actually." Odine continued. "Naturally, zee body should not like a   
foreign creature inhabiting it, yes? That iz zee strange thing about Guardian Forces. You zee,   
most dangerous things..."  
  
Did he just say dangerous? Rinoa, who had been listless and rather disinterested for much of the   
conversation, thinking the man to be crazy anyway, found herself snapping to attention at that   
single word. No one had ever used the term 'dangerous' before in regard to the topic, at least   
not to her.  
  
"Most dangerous things -feel- zat way. When you are infected with a virus, your body, it says   
'no, no.' But with zee Guardian Forces, it says, "yes, yes." Do you ever get that feeling, in   
zee pit of your belly? That worried feeling?"  
  
Rinoa sure did. She was getting it right now.  
  
"Never have I seen a case where a Guardian Force does zat. Ever. I believe that zee body goes   
to -rely- on it, more and more each day. A subject would feel uncomfortable -without- it."  
  
"How would we get rid of them, then?"  
  
Rinoa didn't like the look that was slowly beginning to spread onto his face.  
  
"...Get...rid...of zem?"  
  
  
  
"Get...rid of them?" Selphie asked skeptically.  
  
"I'd imagine you'd need to contact an expert, but..." Dr. Kadowaki started.  
  
"No one is expert on these things. -No one-. We can't trust one opinion over another, not   
really. The Guardian Forces are just too new to us." Xu said. She was sitting cross-legged on   
an open folding chair in the infirmary office. It was the next morning, and they had just   
recently re-grouped after a short rest. Squall personally had been unable to sleep, and he felt   
groggy and out of place where he stood in the corner.  
  
"I asked Rinoa to talk to Odine." He said in response.  
  
"I've learned quite a bit from him, back when I was just a student myself. He's a secretive   
little monster," Xu said. "He's forthright when he's forced to be, but he never tells the whole   
story. His paranoia is almost maniacal."  
  
"Gee, I don't see him as maniacal at all," Zell muttered sarcastically. "Old kook."   
  
"Why don't we just un-junction them?" Selphie asked.  
  
"Well," Xu said. "The Guardian Forces are very addictive, in a way. I think that it simply has   
to do with the powers, that's my reasoning. Few students can give it up. They just can't   
un-junction and leave it at that without running risk of juctioning them again." Dr. Kadowaki   
nodded in agreement.  
  
"Besides," Irvine said, "They're still -in- you, they're just not hooked up."  
  
"That's right," Xu replied. "They would have to be destroyed or released."  
  
The SeeDs in the room exchanged a quick glance. Selphie was the first to speak. "We should just   
release them," she opted.   
  
"But then they could just be picked up again, and worse by someone else." Squall said. "We don't   
want to put these things out where anyone could potentially pick them up again... especially   
when they don't have any idea what they can do. We'd have to destroy them."  
  
"Pah, you're just bitter because you can't remember some stupid dance--"  
  
Quistis silenced Zell with a sharp look. "I agree with Squall," She said. And, having said this,   
she looked around at everyone else. "But I guess the real question is... has any of this ever   
been done before? Would we even know where to start?"  
  
"Yeah," Selphie added. "We can't just clap our heels together and wish them away."  
  
"No," Xu said, and Kadowaki shook her head. "We can't."  
  
"Well," Irvine replied, "Squall said that Rinoa is talking to Odine in Esthar. Maybe he'll be   
able to shine a little light on this."  
  
"She must be taking a later train," Zell said, looking up at the clock for a moment. Squall did   
the same, and felt a pang of worry run through his innards.  
  
"Odine!" Xu cried. Everyone jumped, and she was too excited to even look apologetic. "Gods, I   
just remembered! That's it! Odine was the one who had given us the Garden Guardian Forces!"   
Everyone was looking at her blankly, and she tried intensely to explain. "Shiva and Quezacoatl   
were -given- to us. They were Guardian Forces that didn't need to be captured, because they were   
already confined. You simply had to junction them, remember?"  
  
"Yeah...So?" Squall asked.  
  
"-So-," Xu replied smugly. "They were transferred. That means that they had to have been shipped   
somehow -- and that they had to be contained. Odine had developed..." She paused and waved her   
hands in little circles over her lap, trying to think of a proper word. "I guess 'canisters'   
would best describe them. Odine had been studying the creatures, had finished... when they were   
confined to those storage spaces, they were put in suspended animation--"  
  
"Like Squall, when he went to the Lunar Base!" Selphie exclaimed excitedly. Zell mock-applauded   
and she promptly stuck her tongue out at him.  
  
Xu, however, nodded empathetically. "That's how he got them here. And I'm willing to bet that   
we can transfer those Guardian Forces back into confinement. Odine told me how, in case one   
managed to escape or if it was given to the wrong student... Simple precautions for emergency   
stuff that would never happen... until now."  
  
"...You think it will work?" Irvine asked.  
  
"I guess there's only one way to find out." Quistis said hesitantly.  
  
"...But is it safe?" Selphie asked.  
  
"I can't answer that," Xu said. "But I can't think of anything that would put you in danger.   
Either way, the Guardian Force is just as easy to inject as it is to draw out. Odine outdid   
himself on that... I just wish... I can't believe that I've never thought about it before.   
Anything that we do, we can simply reverse."  
  
Squall found himself checking the time again.  
  
"There's one thing, though. We only have two chambers--if I can find them, even--and they are   
both attuned to only one Guardian Force, the ones that they were built to hold. That means that   
we can only draw those two."  
  
Squall and Quistis exchanged silent glances.  
  
"I'll go first." Squall said.  
  
  
  
It was surprisingly easy to find the said canisters. When everyone looked onto them they found   
the sight to be very anti-climatic. They were simply two cylinders, without marking, groove or   
design... as smooth as steel and indeed composed of some sort of metallic alloy. Selphie took   
one and examined it thoughtfully, watching her face warp in the curve of the object.   
  
"Well," She said.  
  
Dr. Kadowaki had taken Squall into the back and settled him on the bed. It felt to him as if he   
were about to get a medical shot, and Kadowaki clucked about as if the process were just that   
casual and unimportant. However, everyone clustered in with him despite the fact that Kadowaki   
felt the room to be too cramped as it was.  
  
"It's fine," Squall had said while Xu was out searching for the object that would take Shiva out   
of his mind. And, just as they had said... he felt a touch of fear. It was not his own, he knew,   
but the creature's. His addiction knew of its coming demise.  
  
It almost felt as if he were back in the cave with Zenkamuka glowering down at him.  
  
He tried to hide it. His voice was stiffer than usual, though, and everyone could read him like   
an open book. It was almost pointless to even attempt being stoic. However, he continued to   
hold the ruse. "We have to hope that Rinoa is going to take a later train home. If we test this   
now, we have a chance of getting a message to her in Esthar before she leaves. That way, she and   
Odine can--"  
  
"You're just saying that because you want to get this over with before Rinoa gets back and sees   
you do something this crazy," Irvine said with a warm and reassuring smile on his face. "Relax.   
Either way, we'll get whatever information we can to Odine, and he can build more holding devices   
for the rest of these things."  
  
Things. Funny, how they became 'things' when no one needed them anymore. Squall pondered this   
for a moment, knowing full well that the Guardian Forces where what did all the work -- it wasn't   
his leadership, not at all. That was why Xu had allowed them to use the creatures, that was why   
she burned with guilt now that the danger was gone and only the side-effects remained.  
  
"Either way, I want someone there with him when we work this out... I don't particularly trust   
that guy," Squall said in his defense, although he didn't feel that defensive. By then Xu had   
entered again, with Selphie admiring the second cylinder at her heels. She smiled at him when he   
looked up at her.  
  
The Garden had done what it had to do by using Guardian Forces, because the advantages   
out-weighed the dangers. But now, finally, it was over. They didn't have to make sacrifices   
anymore, not if they didn't want to.  
  
"Squall," Quistis said from her place by the door. "I can do this too, you know."  
  
"I'm fine." Squall replied flatly.  
  
"Squall." Quistis drew out the word pointedly.  
  
"Look, I made you Headmaster behind your back, didn't I? I think I deserve this." He was   
worried, the junctioned creature inside him seemed to be radiating some strange energy, and yet   
he forced away enough of his apprehension to push on an uncharacteristic half-smile.  
  
"That's not funny," Quistis said.  
  
"Sorry." Squall sighed and looked over at Xu and Kadowaki. "The truth is, you've been junctioned   
to Quezacoatl longer than I have been to Shiva... it'll be easier on me, right? I think this is   
safer." Sure enough, Xu nodded in agreement. Quistis frowned and crossed her arms over her chest,   
but still she leaned back against the wall in defeat.  
  
"Well, Squall," Xu said. "This seems so sudden, but..." She turned the cylinder flat in her palm.   
"I suppose if we have the means, we shouldn't waste time. I'm not sure what will happen -- I   
want to be honest. Your memories may return, and then they may not. You may feel weaker without   
your strength and vigor junctions. However, that's all that I can think of, when it comes to   
dangers. This thing should just pull out Shiva, as if you were a draw point. It won't affect   
anything else inside of you. Nothing else should happen."  
  
"I don't care." Squall said.  
  
Zell stepped a little closer to Irvine, as if for comfort.  
  
"...Okay." Xu said. Wetting her bottom lip, she ground the canister lip with a twist of her wrist.  
A blue light immediately illuminated her face as two laser-like beams crossed at the top of the   
cylinder. After eyeing it for a moment she lifted her gaze to Squall and watched his face. He was   
emotionless.   
  
Her heart pounded in her chest as she approached him. It was odd, how detached her voice sounded   
when she asked him to put his head back. His hair fell away from his forehead and the light   
caught the grooves of his scar. Squall set his blue eyes into her own for a moment, and then he   
simply closed them.   
  
Xu broke out of her professional stupor for a moment and glanced around the room, letting her   
gaze fall on Kadowaki last. The older woman twisted her face and shrugged. This gesture was   
oddly reassuring in its nonchalance, and she went back to Squall's face with less dread than she   
had felt before.  
  
Slowly, she set the illuminated end of the cylinder onto the young man's left temple. Something   
whirred within the strange machine, and at that comforting sound--it meant that the old thing   
worked--she drew it up around Squall's forehead and toward the opposite side, his right temple.  
  
At the moment it hit home, the metal locked. Xu felt her hand go stiff and then cold, colder   
than she'd ever felt it. The sensation was burning, enough to make her muscles want to crawl   
away and hide... but she was unable to move anything below her elbow.  
  
And then, suddenly, Squall's eyes blankly flew open.  
  
Selphie and Zell whirled, and Irvine threw his arm over his face. Quistis was the only one who   
was able to keep her sight aligned without obstruction, and she was suddenly blinded by a flash   
so white that she couldn't tell up from down, forward from back, or arm from leg. For a moment,   
it seemed as if she didn't exist. There was only the light, and above the light... the air   
screamed with a pitch so high that it was almost a whistle.  
  
...Where had she heard that sound before?  
  
It felt like an eternity, as if time had simply ceased to be. However, at the same time the   
moment was only an instant, shorter than a heartbeat, a blink, a single intake of breath. And   
then that light had never been there, the air was as still as it had always been. If not for the   
fact that Irvine was covering his eyes with a full body wince and everyone else was turned and   
covering their ears...  
  
There would have been no flash, and there would have been no sound.  
  
Irvine had to lower his arm. Zell, Selphie, and Kadowaki had to turn their heads, Xu had to force   
open her clenched eyes... but Quistis had been staring ahead for the entire time, and she only   
had to look.  
  
She only had to look, and see that the bed was empty.  
  
  
  
Rinoa stepped off the train in Balamb and, despite her apprehensions, finally felt a little more   
at ease. She nodded politely at the man who was ushering her out of her cabin with practiced   
movements of his hand and head, and when her feet finally set onto the familiar cement floor...  
  
A sigh. Yes, she was glad to be back, despite it all, she was glad.  
  
Running her hand down the railing as she left it, Rinoa bumped her bag on the bottom step and   
held it at arms length as she crossed the station and made her way down the wide, sunlit   
staircase that led out of the building. The crowd was easier to manipulate, here, because she   
knew this city well, and she even threw a little wave to the shopkeeper in her window, who she   
knew by name.  
  
However, as she turned her head away from the woman with a sun-washed sweep of her warm hair   
against her cheekbone, she saw it. Or, rather, she saw him.  
  
Zell was standing on the other side of the train station. He had stood up, having obviously   
spotted her as well, and something about the way he moved sent shivers down Rinoa's spine. And   
then, behind them, came the familiar frames of Quistis, Irvine, and Selphie.  
  
At the sight of the expressions on their faces, Rinoa's blood turned to stone.   
  
  
  
  
End Book One:  
"A Window To The Soul"  
  
End Part 12/?  
To Be Continued...  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	14. Book Two: Julia's Ballad

Keep watching me

_Keep watching me_

_Too slow--_

_And you're left wanting_

_Wanting me, our love_

_And everything that we were_

_Once upon a time_

_Our youth kept us flying_

_But in this time of age_

_We'll see just how far we've fallen_

_ _

_Keep watching me_

_Things move to fast to waste time_

_Keep watching me_

_Because one day I'll turn around_

_And if you're still there_

_Even if your arms aren't open_

_My joy will be a churning sea_

_In bliss that you were watching me_

_All of this time_

_ _

_I know how to Wait_

_What it is like to be alone_

_With your scent_

_The feel of you_

_Your heart around me_

_Even though you are not there_

_I know how to Wait_

_Because waiting is all that I can do_

_And doing it reminds me of you_

_ _

_Don't close your eyes_

_Because I don't know where I'll be_

_When you finally open them_

_And the mist gets deep_

_It's trickier than love is_

_And if it scares you_

_Remember what we meant once_

_In carefree times when you looked away_

_Knowing that I was still there_

_ _

_Keep watchi_


	15. Part Thirteen

"How can you get very far  
If you don't know who you are?  
How can you do what you ought  
If you don't know what you've got?"  
--A. A. Milne  
  
"To look is one thing  
To see what you look at another."  
--Taoist Saying  
  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part XIII  
  
  
  
In this sector, Esthar was at its prime. Everything was new and shimmering, and the industrial grey-blues were replaced by more vibrant colors -- storefronts blazed neons, the wiring under the glass streets were fluorescent, and everything blared with the muscle-vibrating mixture of heavy-bass techno from various different clubs.   
  
It was night, and above the glow lie nature's contribution. There was not a cloud in the sky, and the cold made the stars shine even more brilliantly against the atmosphere. There was a breeze, and it came warm off the ocean, even though they couldn't see it through the mass of the pleasantly lit city.  
  
Rinoa had departed earlier that afternoon, as Ellone had known she would. However, what the woman did -not- know was that the dark-haired woman had gotten the worst welcome imaginable in her return, and that dark, dreadful events were ensuing in Balamb. How could she have possibly known?  
  
So she simply laughed gaily, as if there weren't a care in the world. To Ellone, there wasn't, not really. However, this would be the last time that she would laugh like this in a very long time, if ever again.  
  
"So we were in Deling, right?" Iskyua said. He was walking pleasantly at her side, dressed in the form-fitting garb of a city soldier. Technically, he was still on duty. However, as he had argued:  
  
"I'm still walking around and keeping an eye on things, right?"  
  
His helmet was gone, though, and he had discarded his more heavy artillery for a smaller pistol that he kept tucked back and away, out of view. And as for 'watching' -- he seemed to be completely attuned to Ellone, caught up in his story in that chattery, easy-going way of his, "I was back training to be a soldier there, couple years back... there was this stupid rant going around the table at the motel bar, you know? We were young and crazy then, nothing like I am now." His hands, which were pleasantly moving in illustration, paused as he gave her a playful little wink. "Well, my -friends- may have grown up, at least."  
  
Ellone smiled and tucked her shawl tighter around her arms. They have taken to the streets, on account that Iskuya wasn't able to drink while he was on duty. The places were too crowded, anyway, he'd told her, they weren't any fun. The walkways were a million times more interesting.  
  
"Yeah," He had said with a wink. "The streets are really in style... excusing, of course, the fact that I have to stay out here and patrol. That had absolutely no weight in anything. None. Would I lie?" He batted his eyes. She had laughed.  
  
Iskuya had been doing most of the talking, she knew, but Ellone didn't mind. She found him pleasant to be around, and had trouble taking her eyes away from him. He was so...magnetic. And, as she looked his way Iskuya met her eyes with his grey ones, smiling with them vaguely as he spoke, as if the electricity was too much to hold. "And those damn bus drivers, you know -- so stubborn. We're like, we want to go to the hotel, and they guy's like, no, you've got to go down the block. This bus takes you to the shopping center." Iskuya threw up his hands. "The hotel is right on the way! You'd think they'd just stop and let us off!"  
  
"'Course, the hotel is just down the street from the shopping center, but still..." Iskuya shrugged. "So we all banded together and... I'm boring you, aren't I?"   
  
The sudden shift in topic drove Ellone into a blink, as she was temporarily set off course by the question. "What? No, of course not!"  
  
Iskuya eyed her carefully, staring into her irises in a way that was both humorous and breathtaking. Ellone felt herself flushing. "...You aren't...lying to me, are you?" He teased. "Come now, Ellone, I'm a tough guy. I can take it. You don't care about the bus story, do you?" He paused and touched a finger to his lips. "Let's see... I can think of another one. How about the drill sergeant story? Or the naked-guy story! Everyone loves that kind of stuff!"  
  
She rolled her eyes a little and grinned. Iskuya pleasantly shared the moment for a while, before continuing in a less showy tone, "Hey, here's an idea -- how about an Ellone story? I haven't heard one of those in a long while."  
  
Ellone let out a little laugh-laced puff of air and slid her eyes off to one side, avoiding his gaze for the first time. "I don't know," She muttered a little, putting her gaze on the dark glass street, a passing woman, and finally another soldier on sentry. "I don't really have any stories to tell..."  
  
"Of course you do!" Iskuya argued good-naturedly. "Everyone has got stories, and I'm willing to bet that they're all better than mine. I mean, heisting a Deling Bus? I'm blushing over the fact that I tried to tell it to you."  
  
"Well...no, it's just..." Ellone brushed a stand of brown hair behind the shell of her ear and looked back at him, shrugging ashamedly. "I guess these last few years... my whole -life-... Well, you know about the war and everything behind it."  
  
"I sure do," Iskuya said, letting out a dark little huff of breath. It was the first sound to come from him that was not cheerful, although his next glance warmed a little. Despite this, however, he looked much more serious. "Do you get to talk about it a lot?"  
  
"Well, sometimes," She admitted. "Now that I'm finally with Uncle Laguna again, it's easier. Sure, we're doing a lot of catching up, but yeah... I've been able to talk to him a lot, about a lot of things."  
  
"Like when you were with Odine?"  
  
Ellone glanced over at him sharply. He was looking at her innocently, and she felt a little rush at the sight. Of course he knew. A lot of people knew. And he didn't mean any harm, it was clear by looking at him. The talkative man simply was offering himself to listen. "...Yeah." She finally answered. "Like with Odine."  
  
"Did he...hurt you?"  
  
Ellone's lips parted a little, but Iskuya jumped to interrupt her, both in gesture and in voice. "Look, I'm sorry. We don't have to get personal if you don't want to. I just don't particularly like that guy, Odine, or how he works. It's okay to be into your job, yeah, but not to that extreme. I guess... I'm just worried."  
  
"Worried?" Ellone narrowed her eyes at him. She had been blushing. "It's over, Laguna rescued me years and years ago..." But still, she wondered. Although the tests were more careful and wary under Laguna's firm eye, she still went to Odine's laboratory on a scheduled basis... had Iskuya known that?  
  
He answered her question. "I guess I've seen you on that side of town, you know?" He tentatively said. For once, he seemed a little listless. Guilty? Ashamed... embarrassed? Yes, the latter seemed to hold the firmest.  
  
Ellone saw this and set a hand on his lightly-armored shoulder. Carefully she shifted her head so that she was meeting his eyes. Her brows lifted reassuringly, and she said, "Really, it's fine... when he was studying me, he found something out... It's not an illness, not really, but he likes to monitor it for what he has convinced Laguna to be an 'important cause.' That's all. Really."  
  
"You're sick?" Iskuya asked.  
  
"No, not really... I'm just... different."  
  
Iskuya looked over at her and smiled, the barest twittering uplift at one corner of his mouth. "You're definitely something, that's for certain."  
  
Ellone let a little breath out from her lips, and in that huff was a laugh, soft and wiltering. Smiling back into his eyes, she felt the first comings of a rush, something that escalated in her chest and lifted her face up to his. She saw him close his eyes, come to meet her, and that feeling rose to a cresting intensity--  
  
And broke.  
  
A guard pushed by her, knocking her unpleasantly into Iskuya's chest. His arms went around her, not in passion but in surprise, as he caught her and tried to keep her on her feet. Both hands turned as the soldier went hurrying by.   
  
Ellone looked over one shoulder, felt her hair crinkle against his chest and her cheek. Suddenly, it felt very cold. Behind her was another guard moving their way, and as her eyes swam wildly from side to side, they stopped on one man after another... standing at the corner, moving hastily down the street, coming out from a building, looking around with some sort of intent in their motions.  
  
The crowd seemed oblivious. They moved on, couples held onto each other, and the music and laughter never shifted a beat. Ellone, however, was shocked into stillness. "What's going on?" She asked. By then she had stepped out of Iskuya's arms, but he was quick to take hold of her elbow.  
  
"I don't know," He said. His voice was low, and when she looked at him, his eyes were roaming as well. "It's nothing to worry about, I'm sure." One look into his face, and she knew that he was lying. "It's probably just another uprooted monster. Let's go."  
  
He pulled on her elbow. This had been done earlier in the night, when he wanted to get her attention and point something out to her. However, this time the tug was firm and controlling. He was tense, she could feel it clearly.  
  
And her feet had just started to move when she saw it. Iskuya was stopped short, and he turned around to look at her over one shoulder. She was staring at a point in front of him, and he turned his head quickly that way, only to look at her again. "Elle?"  
  
"...Iskuya!" With her free hand she pointed. There was a dark space between two clubs, a maintenance building that was a little set back from the street. It was bleak and industrial-looking, and didn't seem to fit with the rest of the sector. This, however, was not what Ellone was motioning toward. Two figures were slipping into that shadowy metal door. They wore the uniforms of Esthar soldiers, but had no helmets... When they looked around warily to make sure that they were covered, Ellone had seen their faces.  
  
Biggs? Wedge?  
  
"I recognize those two!" She said. "They used to be Galbadian soldiers!"  
  
Iskuya looked at her curiously. "...So?" He was still in mid-pull, holding onto her arm and looking fully ready to move. Like ants drawn to honey, the number of soldiers intensified around them, but this was now on the backburner in Ellone's mind.  
  
"What are they doing here?" She asked. "Something's wrong!"  
  
"Elle," Iskuya said reassuringly. She could sense his wariness, and that made his mask of calm seem false, a ruse. "A lot of soldiers here transferred from other systems. -I- was trained in Galbadia too, you know. Remember? There's nothing wrong with me." Nothing, perhaps, except for that increasing anxiety. "Let's keep moving."  
  
"No," Ellone said firmly. "This is different. This is very, very wrong!" Iskuya's nostrils flared a little, but she didn't listen to his arguments any longer. With a jerk she pulled her elbow out of his hold and rushed down the street. Iskuya's eyes went wide and he spun to tear after her.  
  
"Ellone, wait!"  
  
She didn't stop. By then the two once-Galbadian soldiers had closed the door after them, and the building had become darker and more lifeless without their presence. Tearing through the crowd, she ignored the stares and snaps until she was standing in front of the building. Ellone cast one glance over her shoulder, saw Iskuya's head bob above the crowd in his rush to catch up. She thought to wait for him, but didn't want to waste time.   
  
Something horrible was going to happen.   
  
She put her hand on the knob, set her shoulder to the door, took a deep breath, and pushed it open.  
  
The room was dark. It was also empty. Stepping inside, Ellone looked around. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust, but when they did she saw that the room was tiny. She could have lie down and touched her toes on one wall and her fingertips on another. From somewhere came the sound of dripping water, and with a start she realized--  
  
It was coming from below her.   
  
Dropping to her hands and knees, she felt around the floor. Eventually her fingers met a loosened grate cover that had been set aside, and just beyond it there was a dark, depthless hole. She hadn't seen it when she'd stepped in, and was glad that she hadn't kept walking.  
  
Holding her breath, she heard the sound of voices down below, the smack of boots meeting thin puddles of water. Her eyes went wide and slid from side to side, and within two beats she realized that they were heading further and further away. Quickly she reached back, pulled off her shoes and threw them aside.  
  
Turning herself around in her crawl, she finally set her toes onto a rung of the ladder and started easing herself down. It was so dark, and she trembled with each inch of descent. The hole was black and narrow for a moment, and then she broke out into a wide tunnel of what looked like an underground system. There were dim overhead lights, and again her pupils expanded to adjust.  
  
"Ellone!" The sound came from above, just as she set her feet upon the slimy, solid cement floor. She let out a silencing hiss, but Iskuya had something else on his mind for a moment -- he had run right into the hole. There was an oomph and a crack as his knee hit the ladder and his chest smacked on the lip, and then a clatter as he caught hold of a rung and kept himself from plummeting.  
  
Out from his lips came a string of curses so harsh that she was nearly taken aback.  
  
However, fear kept her in check. "Shh!" She hissed.  
  
"Don't 'shh,' me, goddamn it! I almost killed myself!"  
  
"We're going to -both- get killed, if you don't keep quiet!"  
  
"Quiet?! I think I broke something!"  
  
Ellone looked warily from wide to side. "Look, hurry." She said up to him in a low voice. "I can't wait much longer. We can't loose them, Iskuya."  
  
Iskuya learned well from experience. He knew that if he hesitated or argued, she'd leave him behind again. Muttering out hostilities under his breath, he eased himself down the ladder warily, being careful of his throbbing knee. That entire leg was going stiff, and his chest ached where he struck it.  
  
When he finally got onto solid ground, he reached out for her again. She slapped his hand away and looked at him intensely. Iskuya, despite himself, glared back and tried to hide his painful wince inside of that expression.  
  
"What do you expect to happen, Ellone? Even if they are up to no good, what are you going to do about it? Huh? We need to get -help-. There are a dozen soldiers up there. Did you ever consider, you know, going to one of -them- instead of throwing yourself down into the goddamn sewers?"  
  
"Something's wrong. I..." He presented a good argument, but her gut told her that it was wrong. And, upon realizing this, she lifted her chin a little. "I have to keep going. Follow, if you want, or better yet -- go back for that help of yours."  
  
And then she was moving again, running fleetly down the corridor with her feet bared. The sight was almost as humorous as it was terrifying. There she went, a thin girl in a white skirt and a sleeveless shirt, running awkwardly and without form like a newborn fawn. She wouldn't last a second in this dangerous atmosphere.  
  
"And what am I supposed to tell them?" He called to her. "That you had a bad 'feeling', calling all guards, calling all guards? Ellone? Ellone?"  
  
"Shit." He muttered, and ran after her.  
  
  
  
"Why is the water black?" Ellone asked him.  
  
They were keeping a quick pace, but a measured one. The two soldiers had gotten quite ahead of them, but they left dark footprints in their wake. There was no sense in fretting, Iskuya had grumbled, not with a trail set out for them. Chances were that it would lead to a big embarrassment. The guys were probably just maintenance workers.  
  
As he had known, the comment hadn't stopped her.  
  
"Because it's not water," Iskuya replied grudgingly. He looked very irritated to be there. Ellone felt sorry for him, yes, but again she made no offer to pull back. "It's mostly oil residue, runoff from all the machinery that we've got here. An advanced city leaves advanced waste."  
  
They soon found little reason to be silent. As they moved deeper and deeper down the tunnel, they were struck with the loud sound of generators whirring and humming. Iskuya hadn't known what everything was for, but Ellone had a feeling that he was holding back his information. Somehow, she sensed that he knew that something strange was afoot as well...  
  
Telling her would only keep her moving, though, and that was clearly the opposite of what Iskuya wanted. He kept putting his hand on her, as if making sure that she was next to him and safe, even though the lights told him that she was there. Ellone, however, seemed fearless.   
  
"You're going to get your dress dirty," He kept saying.  
  
"Shut up."  
  
"Next time, I choose where we spend the evening, okay?"  
  
"Shut--" The statement shifted into a cry, as she stopped short and went hurtling back into his chest. The entire tunnel shook and rumbled, and with wide eyes and his arms around her Ellone looked up at the ceiling. Something ground, metal squeaking against metal, and then there was a crash and spray of oil as a chunk of rock fell.  
  
Iskuya stepped back against the wall and held her head to him, curling into her protectively. Ellone was blinded for a moment by his hold, her face crushed into the fabric of his uniform, but then she felt something even more terrifying than the trembling ground at her feet. He had sucked in his breath in shock.  
  
Shaking, rattling, she slowly turned her head to look beyond the sanctuary of his arms. Something enormous had risen from the earth, cracking the narrow ravine where the oil river ran and growing so that its head nearly touched the wide, sloping ceiling above them. She saw its back first, human like and twisting with muscle and glistening oil. Long, narrow arms stretched out and sent spider-webs of cracks in the wall as its claw-like fingers dug into the stone, and its enormous, beak-like jaw spread open with a dry creak, exposing rows of needle-sharp teeth so long that it was unable to close its mouth.  
  
Iskuya was unable to step back, because he was already firm against the wall. Pulverized rock fell onto his head in the form of dust, and he pulled Ellone more tightly into him. Slowly one hand unwound, and with rattling bones he reached back for his pistol.  
  
"S-s--ta..tay sti-sti-still..." He stuttered very, very slowly. His gaze was locked onto the creature, which was pulling its spidery arms back and eyeing the two of them like a hawk would eye a mouse. "V-very...very....sti-stil--Damn it, MOVE!"  
  
Ellone felt a rush as he let go and shoved her forward. Loosing her balance, she fell to the ground and landed flat on her stomach. There was a huff and intense pain as Iskuya landed partially on top of her. Just as they had spun away the creature had thrust its claws into the wall where they had been standing, and rocks broke to fall all around them. Ellone fearfully put her arms over her head, and she felt Iskuya do the same.  
  
"Run!" He cried, as he rolled off her and onto his chest. His pistol was in both hands, and with his cropped hair lopsided, a black smudge on one cheek and his eyes intense, he pulled the trigger to fire at the creature, which was pulling its arms out from the wall again in a spray of dust. Ellone watched this with wide eyes, and then in a rush of panic she shoved herself his way and knocked his elbows up.   
  
Both bullets that he had fired harmlessly pounded into the ceiling.  
  
"What in the hell are you doing?!"  
  
"What in the hell are -you- doing?! It's covered in oil!" Ellone snapped back. They would have continued the argument, save the fact that the creature was sending its nail-like claws down at them again. With a shove of her heels Ellone sent herself launching forward, and Iskuya rolled again. Both narrowly missed impalement. The walkway crumbled, and with a clench of its fist that portion was torn away. Angrily, the monster threw its handful of rock back over one shoulder and dug into the walkway again, setting its beady eyes on Iskuya.  
  
By then the man had gotten to his feet, and with his head low he sprinted down what was left of the walkway. Letting out a deafening roar, even above the generators, the creature tore out the rock in front of him. Iskuya did a double take and leapt back, putting himself against the wall again in terror. He stood on an eight-yard long shooting range, and found himself to be the target.  
  
Ellone had fallen into the ravine, and her entire back was covered in oil when she dragged herself out on the opposite side. It smeared when she wiped her face, and with a wince she heard Iskuya's cries from over the generators, the crashes, and the roars. Painfully she pushed herself to her feet, shaking, and then she saw it:  
  
Iskuya stood on a small island with his back to the wall. There was nowhere else for him to go, and half of his head was in a gashed crevice in the cement. Blood drizzled down the side of his face, and his eyes were wide, his hands claws against where he stood, and his chest heaved madly in his terror.  
  
Everything seemed to move slowly as the monster reared back its bony arms, and Ellone felt her lungs expand in the beginnings of a scream, something that her mouth was too stiff to allow her to push out. "No," She hissed without a breath, so softly that she didn't even hear herself say it.  
  
"No!" This time, the sinews of that oily mass shifted and it moved, looking over its narrow shoulders. Ellone realized just what she'd done, and with a rush of panic she stepped backwards. Iskuya too, having realized that the final strike had not come, opened his eyes to see the monster turning to face away from him.  
  
"Ellone!" He cried.  
  
But she was not listening. Her thin lips trembled, she stepped back again in spite of herself, and then she tensed her jaw and narrowed her eyes. All of a sudden she was moving across the walkway and toward the creature, she set her feet together and brought her two longest fingers to the inside of her arm, which she rapidly extended. Closing her eyes, she lowered her head.  
  
There was a flash and a whirling hiss, as a circle of light wound about the ground at her feet. And then, glowing and blank-eyed, she threw open her arms. There was a burst of radiant energy, a rush that spiraled and screamed down the tunnel. Iskuya turned his cheek against the stone, and the creature retracted.  
  
It visibly shuddered, and then the glow died.  
  
Ellone dropped her arms. Her legs were wobbly, and that powerful confidence died along with the light that had come with it. Woozily, she staggered off to one side and fell in a slump against the wall.  
  
Stunned, Iskuya watched this, and then he saw the creature lift its arm to strike at her. Whatever she had done, it didn't seem to have any eff--  
  
And then, suddenly, the blackness of the oil that made up the creature's flesh began to loose its sheen. The muscles started to knot and drew into each other, drying out and turning a dust-like grey. That arm trembled in mid-air, and for a moment the monster seemed frozen in time. And then the joint of its elbow shattered, crumbled down to its wrist, its shoulder, its neck and torso.  
  
That oil had broken into ash.  
  
Iskuya watched the enormous monster catch and billow down to the ground in powdery pieces, and through the snowflakes of black he saw her standing there, dazedly against the wall with dizzy, half-empty eyes.   
  
He stared blankly at her until the blackness took hold of him and dragged him into unconsciousness. Even as he fell, that image remained in his mind.  
  
  
  
Ellone knew that she had to keep moving, and somehow she did. With a push of her shoulder-blades she stumbled away from the wall and toward the oil-filled gully. She probably could have jumped it, if she braced herself and used all of her energy, but she didn't have any energy to use. Tiredly she slogged across and dragged herself onto the small island where Iskuya was slumped in a seated position.  
  
"Are you okay?" She asked. Her voice cracked. Iskuya groaned and rolled his head, but that was enough for her. Tensing herself, she managed to straighten and start walking. Crossing through more sludge where the monster had torn out the path, she eventually reached a straight way of solid ground.  
  
"Ellone?" Iskuya was calling after her. He sounded dreary, and she didn't have to turn around to know that he was still slumped over in half-awareness. Her magic had affected him, and she knew that it would be a while before he could stand. She couldn't wait that long, she couldn't wait another minute.  
  
"I have to keep going," She called to him. "You can catch up."  
  
She didn't wait for his reply, although he drowsily kept calling her name.  
  
At the next turn the tunnel seemed oddly clean in comparison to the newly-formed wreckage that she had left behind. Miserably she tried wiping the oil from her arms and her legs, rubbing her hands against the wall to clean them as best she could. The smell was nauseating, and it didn't help that she was dizzy.  
  
But slowly her energy began to return, her eyes began to clear, and her heart began to pound. Hard.  
  
The pair of footprints were clear, and she rounded a corner that took her to a niche in the wall. There was less light here, but she could still see clearly -- it was little more than a square space. The river did not turn, it kept going straight... and the niche seemed like nothing more than a short hallway carved into the wall. A dead end...or so it seemed. The footprints lead there. Tentatively, Ellone edged down it. Her bare feet made not a sound, and she held her breath inside her chest.  
  
With wide eyes she slowly made her way to the wall that ended the hallway and turned around in a small circle. She couldn't see the oily trail in this lighting. Carefully she looked up, trying to find another ladder, a hole...but there was nothing.  
  
Her answer ended up being right next to her. Idly, frustrated, Ellone had looked off to one side. There, set in the wall, was a steel door. Her heart skipped a beat and leapt into her throat. With wide, wary eyes she inched forward, looking it up and down. As she neared she started to hear voices. Arguing.  
  
"Don't ask me, the boss said it was right here."  
  
She set her hands silently against the door and then put her ear up to it. Her lips parted a little so that she could hear better, and with hardly a breath she tried to catch as much of the conversation as she could.  
  
"We hook it up -right- here. Look, look at the picture. Idiot."  
  
"Here? What about there?"  
  
"No. Look, count them. Third one down. We hook up this thing into this part of the switchboard, and then connect. That'll give us complete control of the city's security system. Home free, medals of honor."  
  
"That's what you always say, Biggs. That's what you always say -right- before everything goes to hell."  
  
Oh, why didn't she wait for Iskuya?! He was right, what was she thinking? She didn't want to go through this alone. However, as the conversation began to quiet and the sounds of working took its place, she felt her resolve rise along with her panic. What were they doing? The security system? What was going to happen, once they got control of it?  
  
...Oh Gods, Oh Gods, Oh Gods..  
  
"Okay, we tie these wires together right he--"  
  
Ellone sucked her breath tightly into her chest and slammed the door open with her shoulder. Her tight lungs forced out that air, and she turned her terrified exhalation into a cry. "Stop!"  
  
The two soldiers stared blankly at her. One of them had a wire in his hand, and the other a flashlight in his mouth. It dropped to the floor in his shock. Ellone looked from one to the other warily, and it took all of her will not to run away.  
  
"What are you doing?!" She asked accusingly. "You're not supposed to be here!"  
  
The soldiers exchanged glances, and then looked at her again. "Who in the hell are you?"  
  
Ellone's nostrils flared, and in a burst of improvisation snatched a pipe off one of the machines in the room. While doing so she caught a glance at exactly where they were, and it looked to be a control-area of sorts. It was probably what managed all of the underground generators in this area...  
  
Holding up the pipe in front of her, she managed a stance. "My friend is going for Esthar security right now!" She cried, trying to make her terror sound like bravery, her lie like the truth. "We know who you are, and...and..."  
  
They looked amused, and with cruel swaggers they slowly advanced on her. "Security?" The larger one said. "You just got a transfer of new soldiers today, I'd imagine that they're on patrol right now?"  
  
The other one grinned. "They have loyalty to us."  
  
Ellone's breaths rattled frightfully in the cold basement air. With wild-eyes she looked from one to the other. Loyalty to -who-? But then, it was starting to make sense. Why were all of the soldiers gathering over this sector? It had seemed so mysterious...  
  
Security...soliders...  
  
"An invasion...?"   
  
"You could say that," Biggs said. Wedge slammed a fist into his palm. "Let's just say that it's an offer that you can't refuse. Heh."   
  
"I can't believe this. -This- is our retaliation," Wedge chuckled. "I'm going to have -so- much fun wit--"  
  
Ellone didn't stand around to listen any longer. With a grunt and clenched teeth she leapt forward and swung the pipe like a baseball bat. There was a crack as she connected with the top of Wedge's head. The man had attempted to dodge, but all he saved was his skull from being crushed. He was knocked off his feet.  
  
Biggs threw up his hands. Ellone, in a frenzy, faced him and swung the pipe around furiously. The soldier took a step back, but she kept herding into him. "Why!?" She cried. "What have we ever done to you, except GIVE!? We opened our goddamn gates to the world, and what does it do?! Attack?! Huh?! Answer me!"  
  
Wedge groaned and tried to push himself up. He flopped, and after the third try managed to get onto his bottom. He dizzily put his head between his knees. "Shit, man."  
  
Biggs put his hand down to reach for his weapon, but Ellone was more ready for this than she had ever been for anything else. Powerfully she snapped at him, cracking the pipe into his wrist .The pistol clattered onto the floor, and flew back as her foot hit it. She threw herself at him wildly.  
  
He managed to catch the pipe in a hand before it connected with him, and together the two of them crashed into one of the control panels. The lights in the room flipped on, and then dimmed again. Ellone was still screaming at him, so terrified that she had gone temporarily mad, and Biggs was starting to cry out as well.  
  
"Stay out of this city!" She cried.  
  
"We were hired, it's not our fault, Lady! Lady! Lay off!" Biggs was breaking into a whine, until he finally got a firm grip on her shoulders. Powerfully, she lifted her off him and threw her down. Ellone's mind scattered in panic as she went sailing, and then she let out a painful cry as her back met the cement floor, right in front of the open doorway.  
  
"Damn it," Biggs said, brushing himself off. Wedge painfully got himself to his feet, and he looked at the fallen woman roll onto her side and curl up into herself. "What a joke."  
  
Wedge murmured a reply and painfully rubbed at the side of his head.  
  
Ellone got onto her hands and knees, with her hair hanging and her bottom facing the two soldiers. She was panting and humiliated. She could feel their eyes on her, staring... they didn't come after her. She was so weak, so helpless, and so pathetic that they didn't even bother coming after her right away. She was going to die, and they weren't even going to put any effort into it.  
  
And then, suddenly, the heel of her hand met something on the floor. With a rush she lowered her eyes and saw the butt of Biggs' pistol. Her chest constricted and her heart sped up in realization. Too afraid to look over her shoulder and see if they had noticed, she edged back and set her hand upon the weapon.  
  
With them watching, she eased herself painfully to her feet. Her back was to them, and it was surprisingly easy to hide the pistol, hold it against her stomach. She tried to get her finger around the trigger, and kept hunched over. It wasn't hard to pretend that she was in pain -- she was. Her shoulders, her arms, her legs... everything hurt.  
  
"Well, sweetheart," Biggs said. "I'll have to congratulate you. You're going to be the first casualty of this mission."  
  
And then she was spinning toward him, gun in hands and pointed right at his face.   
  
"Draw your weapon and I shoot," She snapped to Wedge, who was already making the motion. He dropped his hands and sneered at her.  
  
"Damn it, where did that come from?"  
  
"It's yours, you moron," Wedge hissed.  
  
"Quiet, both of you." Ellone said. "I have some questions, and you're going to answer them. Understand?"  
  
They glared at her.  
  
"Good," Ellone said.   
  
Glare.  
  
"Who sent you?" She asked. They were silent for a moment, and Ellone felt at a loss. What if they didn't answer at all? Would that mean that she would have to shoot them? She didn't want to kill anyone...  
  
Oh, why didn't she listen to Iskuya!  
  
"The General of the Galbadian Army." Wedge said bitterly.  
  
"...Galbadia?" Ellone said incredulously. "But..." Her eyes roamed about for a moment, confused.  
  
"Is that a question?" Wedge tittered. "'Cause I don't quite know how to answer it, and I really, really don't want to di--"  
  
Biggs elbowed him sharply in the side.  
  
"Where in Galbadia is he?" Ellone asked. She didn't know if she was asking the right questions, but she had to make due as she was. For now, she tried to get what she could, and hopefully she would be able to get them back to the surface...  
  
...Where Galbadian soldiers lurked in disguise...  
  
Oh, Gods. What was she going to do?  
  
And then three realizations hit her. Neither man had answered her question, and both were smirking. These, however, were nothing in comparison to the third.  
  
An enormous shadow broke up the dim light in the room, and she heard the click of a firearm ring out right behind her. All of the blood rushed to her feet, and then Biggs visibly relaxed, despite the fact that Ellone still had his own gun aimed at him.  
  
"It's about time you got down here, Boss. As you can see, we have a little problem."  
  
Wedge was grinning painfully.  
  
Ellone knew that she had lost. It was over. Trembling, she found that she had lost control of her arm. It dropped to her side, and her quivering fingers slowly began to vibrate the gun where she held it. Like a penny on a shaking table, it eventually slipped out of her hold and clattered onto the floor.  
  
Why had she tried to do this alone?   
  
"Boss? What's up?"  
  
Ellone saw the expression shift on Biggs face, saw the barest glimmer of confusion lace into his irises. Narrowing her eyes, she set her heels and slowly turned around to see what had made him hesitate.  
  
Iskuya was standing behind her, haggard and torn, with the barrel of his pistol extended purposefully. Ellone felt her jaw go slack and then a blissful feeling of relief rose up into her heart. Tears sprang into her eyes, and her hand went onto her chest. "Oh, thank god," She whispered.  
  
Iskuya was still looking levelly at her. Ellone, unable to blink, stared into his face. Never did she look down at the gun barrel; never did she see the way that the pistol was perfectly leveled with not Biggs, nor Wedge... but her. She didn't need to. All she had to do was look at his face, and she knew.  
  
Ellone felt those tears of relief begin to burn painfully in her wide eyes, and she took a stunned step away from him. Backwards, but not far enough.  
  
"...I'm sorry." Iskuya said. But he couldn't have been that sorry, because before he even finished that last word he pulled the trigger.   
  
  
  
End Part 13/?  
To Be Continued. 


	16. Part Fourteen

"Don't wanna talk about it   
I say why not?   
Don't wanna think about it   
I say there's got   
To be some good   
Reason for that   
Little black backpack   
Upsmack -- turn around   
He's on his back end..."   
--Stroke 9   
  
  
  
"For When You Return"   
Part XIV   
  
  
  
Location: The Time of The Sixth World   
Two Eternities Before the Present Day   
  
"Lookit that guy, Brogan."   
  
"I'm lookin', Ando."   
  
The pub in Merada was bustling with its Friday crowd. It was late evening and a perfect time to drink -- and that was what drew the village laborers there. The tables and the bar were filled, and the room was thick with chatter and laughter. One man, however, came out louder than the rest. No one knew his face, for he was a traveler to these parts, but a few of the people who were gathered that night would remember it from then on.   
  
He sat at a filled table, with ten chairs crowded together. Some shoulders were stooped, others were straight... but his frame was lazy, idly resting against his seat. One arm went up and atop the back of his chair, and the other nonchalantly held a hand of cards. His eyes were hazel and bright and his smile was radiant in a casual sort of way. At the seat of his chair was a bulging backpack, and his long legs were stretched out. All in all, he was a thin and very carefree-looking man.   
  
His hair ran in a short braid down his back and the rest was in choppy black waves. With elegant fingers he teased a few of those strands back, and he rolled a toothpick from one side of his mouth to another in a humored, coy little way. "So, boys.... lay them down?" They all gave him cool glances, but the man simply beamed his response.   
  
It was that face that the men called Brogan and Ando watched. Both of them were large and meaty, mason-workers or something close to that. Brogan was clean shaven and Ando was as hairy as the ape that he resembled -- and both of their eyes shone with vehemence. The hairy man gripped his fist tightly with his free hand, and his companion ground his teeth.   
  
"Ready, ready...?" With a flourish the lean man ran his cards across the table in a clean sweep. He seemed to have had practice in this, and he nearly posed with his hand up in the air, thumb touching index-finger. Casually he looked around the table.   
  
A man threw his cards down bitterly. Another stood up and left. The others simply glowered. These looks were met with a smile, as the man shrugged humouredly and scooped the pile of coins that was their bet into an already enormous pile in front of him. He looked down at this again all of a sudden, and then let out a low whistle.   
  
"Wow, I look away for a second and--bam--it gets bigger. Crazy, huh?"   
  
"Yeah, real crazy." The voice came from one side, and the man slid his hazel eyes up in that direction. Sure enough, Brogan was standing next to him with Ando acting as backup. They had their massive arms crossed over their equally large chests, and the little smirks on their faces were far from pleasant.   
  
"...Well," The dark-haired man said, "I'm sensing a bit of hostility here. I think I'll just--"   
  
He had been sitting up to reach for his winnings when there came the definite sound of metal leaving its sheath. Before he had time to swallow there was the sickening paper-thin feeling of a blade at his throat, and the man's lips left his teeth in a smile that was most certainly tense. One hand, however, tapped its fingers on the tabletop.   
  
Brogan, who had pulled the dagger, narrowed his eyes. "I've been watching you all night, buddy. You haven't lost a round yet. -That's- what's crazy, and you're going to get a different 'bam' out of it, if you know what I mean." And, just in case this was a poor illustration, Ando added to the comment by slamming a fist into his palm.   
  
The man, who was still under the blade, managed a little shrug. The movement nicked him, and a little blood trickled, but he kept his face blankly amused. "Look, if you fellas are going to rape me, do take it outside. There are ladies pre--"   
  
Spittle flew, as Brogan lost his patience and backhanded the man angrily across the back of the head. It hurt, of course, and the lanky fellow's face hit the table in rebound. However, the blade had been pulled away in the strike. The small cut in his throat stung as the salt of his sweat hit it, but the threat was temporarily set aside.   
  
Keeping his face on the table--and feeling like a ostrich with its head in the ground in the meanwhile--the man listened to Brogan's angry retort:   
  
"Comments like that kill people, traveler." He snarled. "And on top of cheating, it doesn't add up very well in your favor."   
  
"Woah, now," The man lifted a hand in objection, although he just barely brought his head up, as if in fear of having it slammed back down again. "Since when is cheating an issue, huh?" There was a firm tug as Brogan grabbed hold of his braid and forcefully brought his face up. The table in front of him was a mess, the traveler saw, with cards scattered and chairs pushed back where the other players had been. Most of them had fled to join the circle of onlookers.   
  
"Don't play games." Brogan hissed. "There's no way that one man can win every round he plays like that, with flying colors. You're too confident."   
  
There was a great ache in the back of the traveler's head, on account that Brogan still held tightly onto his hair. Sweat beaded and ran down his temples, his cheeks, and the skin around his mouth and jaw felt tight. He felt so many eyes on him, and through the haze of his fear and pain he saw everyone in the room staring his way   
  
"Look, buddies," He stammered. "I don't cheat. I'm just...lucky." Warily he slid his eyes back, until they strained against their sockets, but he was unable to see Brogan's face behind him. It didn't matter. He could feel the contempt-filled anger like a wave of heat.   
  
"...Well, -buddy-," Brogan said. "Your luck just ran out."   
  
A tight-bodiced barmaid was clinging frightfully to the shoulder of one of the men that was observing the scene. Her eyes were wide and her thin little fingers were white-tipped where she pinched herself against the fabric of his shirt. The traveler's misty gaze went up into her own, and then for a moment he slipped a little grin onto the corner of his lips and winked at her. She started, and then he was grabbing hold of a deck of cards.   
  
Whirring, and with the ease of a court-jester, the traveler sent the cards flapping into Brogan's face. The meaty man had been pulled down as the braid in his hand was suddenly jerking forward and around, and with a ~fwap-fwap-fwap~ he was struck directly in the eyes with a flurry of all fifty-two squares.   
  
Not wasting any time, the traveler--who was still leashed to Brogan by a firm grip on his braid--lifted his bottom off the chair and sent it hurtling Brogan's way by the shove of one foot. His braid was then released, and the large man was sent back into his equally large companion.   
  
With the grace of an acrobat and a bounce of his knees the traveler leapt straight into the air. He came to a landing on top of the table with a clatter and scrape of his coins. From his back he pulled two swords out from the sheaths that were crossed on his hips. The blades were thin and only as long as his forearms, but they were still effective.   
  
Behind him, the crowd released a breath that had been held back in unison. Brogan faltered for a moment and jerkily regained his balance. Wiping his mouth, he flashed his eyes with an insane sort of fury, and shoved his sleeves up on his arms. Ando, who had been equally startled by this display, curled his upper lip menacingly.   
  
"Get him!" Brogan cried. He had quite a following -- eight out of the ten men who had lost their money to the traveler in the card game stepped forward. There was a flurry as blades were drawn, and Brogan flipped his dagger coolly. The traveler, however, simply leapt onto the next table.   
  
A man called Arneson, who happened to have been a doctor, took a swing at him. With fluid and graceful ease the gangly journeyman parried the blow with the flat of his sword and, in the manner of an arrogant thespian smacked the doctor's cheek in respite. His second blade went back to block a blow that came from behind, and then he was jumping again -- this time onto a chair.   
  
He landed awkwardly, so that his foot accidentally pushed onto the back of the seat -- setting the entire piece of furniture off-balance. Like a lever he fell toward the floor... and, unwittingly, avoided a fatal swing from another man's sword. Landing hard on his knees, he pushed himself out of the way of an over-turning table with a push of his legs and a throwing of his arms, tucking his blades against his sides safely.   
  
That table acted as a shield to him, and a thrown dagger plunged into the wood before it reached the traveler's flesh. He wouldn't have known of this stroke of fortune if not for Brogan's cursings -- he had thrown the weapon, and the man who had hoped to pin the traveler down with the table was at the butt of the mistake.   
  
Rolling, the gangly man got to his feet. People were closing in on him on all sides, and with wide eyes he lashed out with his blades--miraculously tangling up the swords that came his way so that one striking man accidentally blocked another--and whirled out of the circle as best he could. By then everyone but those involved in the brawl had fled for cover, either out the door or behind the bar, where a pair of eyes peeked out from every now and then before ducking back down quickly.   
  
Unfortunately, the man had by then dodged and fled all the way across the tavern. Finding himself against a wall, he quickly tried to situate his bearings to locate a door. However, the hairy ape called Ando had pulled an axe out from somewhere--the thing looked heavier than the traveler himself was--and was coming quickly his way with the weapon overhead and ready to strike.   
  
"Look, can't we talk abou--"   
  
The traveler's lips drew back from his teeth in a painful grimace as the axe came down on his head. There was a thud, and an intense pain. This, however, he soon discovered, was from the resounding vibration of the wall beneath his skull. The heavy stone axe had dug in right next to his left ear.   
  
His eyes cracked open, and then looked widely off to one side. His vision was completely blocked off by the axe's head, boxing him in. For a moment he stared, and just breathed. Into his nostrils came the sour sent of Ando, whose sweaty armpits were exposed by the fact that he was trying to pull the axe from the wall again. They were so close that they could have been embracing. From behind came the shouts of the crowd.   
  
"It looks pretty stuck there," he said frankly. Ando continued to jerk at it.   
  
"Try wedging it up and down a little, wriggle it a bi--" The traveler was sharply cut off by a blow to the stomach. Apparently Ando -had- given up, and he resorted to heaving his fist soundly into the pinned man on the wall before him. The muscles in his belly contorted and his face grew tight with pain... his lanky frame buckled over sharply and from the back of his throat came a choking gag.   
  
His collar tightened as Ando took hold of his shirt and lifted him clear off the ground, so that his feet swung. His twin machetes dangled limply off his wrists like the wings of a child's toy airplane, and he began flailing out protests as Ando's thick fingers tightened around his clothes and flesh. With a gasp and a rush of expelled air he was slammed against the wall.   
  
Another crash, and then another. By then the traveler's breath had been crushed out of his lungs, so that he could no longer breathe. There were cheers. This had nearly become a sporting event.   
  
"Look," He managed to gasp between blows. "Can't I..." A wince, and then a painfully unplesant attempt at a good-natured grin. "...Just...apologize?"   
  
He was answered by a full body lift. Somehow he had managed to retain hold on his weapons the whole time, although he had no use for them now. Every muscle in his body was loose and painfully unhelpful.   
  
His stomach dropped and then shot into his throat at the realization that he had hit open air. Twisting, he was hurtled a good distance toward the center of the room. With a crash he landed on the table that he had playing cards on earlier, and the wood cracked and opened beneath him like a fissure. With a spray of splinters, cards, and coins he smashed onto the floor.   
  
For a moment everything was silent. There had been an eruption of joy at his landing, but everything had died after a few moments on the ground. Wincing, and bleeding from one cheek, he lay on his back and listened. Footsteps. A whole bunch of them.   
  
This was probably why his mother told him never to gamble.   
  
Just as he started to shift, anxious to rise and flee while he had the time, there came a tight pressure as Brogan's boot pressed onto his chest and uncomfortably eased him back down. The man looked even larger when he loomed overhead like that, and the bulb in the traveler's throat bobbed uncomfortably.   
  
With a toe Brogan eased the flap of the fallen man's vest off to one side. There was a glitter, and the large man's lifting eyebrow was met by the narrowing of the traveler's own. With his free hand he moved to cover the exposed prize, but Brogan was quick to kick his fingers away.   
  
"...That's a nice necklace there, boy. Who'd you steal it from?"   
  
"My mother gave it to me." The traveler said. The room filled with dry little chuckles.   
  
Brogan looked back and shared that laugh, standing over the traveler with his foot mounted on his chest, as if he had conquered some great feat. When he looked down, the skinny man's hazel eyes were unreadable -- that playful, innocent nature was almost nearly gone, and replaced by a cold blankness.   
  
"Something bothering you?" Brogan asked coldly.   
  
The man smiled thinly. "No, no... It's just funny, ya know?"   
  
"No," Brogan replied. "I -don't- know."   
  
"Oh," As if he weren't under the heel of an enormous brute, the traveler lifted a thin hand and flittered it around casually, as if he were having a conversation about the weather, or that day's gossip. His voice, however, was tight and pointed. "It's just...Heh-heh... You know, kind of tickling to see that it's suddenly one-on-one now that the guy's down. See how everyone is standing back--Oh, hold on, let me get my head up a little," The man did so, and motioned with his chin against his chest toward the stuffy onlookers. "...Standing back now that I've been properly brought down. There was no glory before then."   
  
Brogan, who finally caught on, threw his head back and laughed. "-You- want to fight me? All you'll achieve with that is a few moments in addition to your life and a whole lot more pain."   
  
"Pain builds character," The traveler replied. "I like pain."   
  
Wary, but too confident to be that concerned over the matter, Brogan eased his weight off the man's chest and carefully brought his foot back. The traveler couldn't hide it -- relief in the fact that he could finally take a full and painful breath. And, as he did that, Brogan put a hand back and motioned for everyone to stay put. "Get up, boy."   
  
Tensely, the traveler got to his feet. With careful motions he re-sheathed his blades at their holders across the small of his back. Putting his arms to his sides, he watched Brogan with anxious eyes. "...You want to count it off?" He asked.   
  
"No," Brogan said. "I'll give you the first blow."   
  
"Deal," the lanky man said quickly, and he darted down to sweep his backpack out of the rubble that was the crushed table. With a jerk of his feet, he was running toward the door. Brogan, totally shocked by this sudden shift into cowardice, let out a cry and grit his teeth to tear after him -- no mercy, now.   
  
There was one small hindrance, however.   
  
There was a sudden jerk, and then Brogan was falling. He landed with a painful crash and twist of his ankle. With wide and surprised eyes, he looked back and saw that the shoelace of his boot was knotted to one of the pieces of the table. His nostrils fumed in realization, and with a growl he slammed his fist on the floor and looked toward the swinging doorway.   
  
By the time anyone got outside, the traveler was gone.   
  
  
  
  
End Part 14/?   
To Be Continued


	17. Part Fifteen

"I know it's just a Spring Haze  
But I don't much like the looks of it  
And all we do is circle..."  
--Tori Amos  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part XV  
  
  
"What do you mean, -gone-?!" Rinoa cried. There was a strange sort of warble forming in the back of her throat, as if she had just spent a great amount of time singing two octaves higher than what her voice could handle. This was almost true -- inside, she was still screaming.   
  
Zell, Quistis, Irvine, and Selphie stood tensely against the wall in Xu's small office. They were silent -- and had been that way as well on the ride back from Balamb. Zell, especially, was surprised by this... there was so much to say, so much to talk about... At first it had been a tizzy of words and explanations, but like a firecracker the burst went quick. Soon every question that Rinoa shot at them was reflected with a brief answer, an 'I don't know, I really don't.' And, as the girl got more and more distressed, their replies got shorter and shorter. It had been a painful ride.  
  
What could they have said?   
  
Xu, however, brought herself up to answer the best that she could. She looked just as bashful--if not more--than the rest, and found it difficult to meet Rinoa's eyes. But she did so, and with iron rods in her heart she said,  
  
"We've made a mistake. No one really had a -reason- to eject a Guardian Force before, this was the first time that we..."   
  
At first Rinoa had looked accusing, almost pointed in her stare. The glossiness to her eyes betrayed her, however, and that blank look slipped steadily down into dank mournfulness, disbelief... She felt very alone all of a sudden, to the point where she could sense the chilled air currents against the flesh of her arms, feel the carpet beneath the soles of her shoes, the tickle of her hair against her neck like a ghost's breath...  
  
She felt like a pillar, the hand of a weathered stone sun-dial. The muscles of her arms where she crossed them over her chest were taut, and her fingers gripped to the point of pain. Rinoa noticed, but she didn't release her hold.  
  
(If...If Guardian Forces...) She thought.  
  
"I...Rinoa, I don't know what to say quite yet." Xu continued, too wrapped up in her own distress to take much note of the expression on Rinoa's face. The others saw, however, and the sight was something that drove their hearts into their toes. Rinoa was more than stricken -- she seemed almost like a different person for a moment. The way that she stood there, silent. Still. She had gotten surprised, questioning, and even angry... but had hardly shed a tear once the news had come. Her eyes were glazed, but did not yet overflow. Not even close.  
  
(If Guardian Forces could entwine with a mind...)  
  
(...Was that what Odine was talking about?)  
  
"We've searched the Garden. Nothing. Whatever happened, it happened in that room -- and something -did- happen, Rinoa. I can't say what, not yet...."  
  
(Is that why...)  
  
(....Is that why he called them dangerous....?)  
  
"We have a lead, though," Xu was saying. "It involves the Guardian Force, obviously, and with that we can at least get a start... We can talk to--"  
  
"People don't just -disappear-!" Rinoa exclaimed. Everyone in the room started; Zell nearly jumped. Xu's tense eyes grew wide and clear for a moment, as the dark-haired girl broke into outburst. "It's impossible!" Rinoa cried again, looking around at each and every one of them. This time, she added firm pointed-ness to her words. "You don't...just...disappear!!"   
  
"Rinoa, calm down," Selphie said.   
  
"And this is coming from Selphie," Zell added. Irvine pushed a dull elbow into his ribs. Zell's face was a little too clay-like to wince much, especially the way that Rinoa didn't seem to respond. The lanky young woman simply stood stoop shouldered, staring at him with a mixture of anger and defeat.   
  
"Look, we just need to think about what Odine said," Quistis added, looking between the two. Rinoa's eyes lifted and settled on her own, and Quistis felt her heart skip a little as if she had been caught in a trap. She suddenly realized just what Xu was going through. The prim woman was a blurry form in the background, something that she couldn't quite focus on with her gaze upon Rinoa. Everything seemed blurred for a moment, except for Rinoa.  
  
...That look on her face.  
  
"That's right," Irvine said. His voice was by far the most -normal- of the group. Everyone was forced into dull, partially-rational calm... but it was only Irvine who seemed fully casual. One look at the lines on his face, however, and he was just as exposed as the rest of them. "You said that GFs can be entwined with a mind, right?"  
  
"Yeah," Selphie added. "Maybe Shiva took him with her!"  
  
Zell opened his mouth, closed it, and then looked around before speaking. "Um...Into the ...canister?" He asked hesitantly.  
  
Irvine shot him a glare.   
  
"It's a perfectly legit question!" Zell snapped.  
  
Quistis rolled her eyes flatly and scratched at the side of her head. Xu, however, lifted her shoulders in a shrug and wet her thin lips warily. "That's the thing, though. It worked. Shiva ejected just fine. No flaws, no complications..."  
  
"...We should still get it checked out," Irvine said. "Odine should see it."  
  
Zell put on a little grin, in spite of himself. "What was that, Irvy? What are you checking for...? Hmmm?"  
  
"He...is...not...in....the...freaking...canister!" Irvine cried. He threw up his gangly arms in punctuation to his statement.  
  
"That's all great," Rinoa said dryly from where she had been quietly standing amidst the melee. Her arms slid up and folded over her chest a little. One hand idly graced an elbow, worried and irritated. "But that doesn't fix anything."  
  
"We need to talk to Odine." Xu said. "It's as simple as that. He's our best chance, and our most easily accessible one--"  
  
"No, wait," Rinoa interrupted. There was a strange sheen to her words. "I've already spoken to Odine!" There was something firm and desperate in her voice, something that made Xu hesitate to respond. The room was silent for a long and drawn out moment.  
  
"We have different questions, now." Xu finally said.  
  
For a moment Rinoa simply stared at her. There was something tense, rough, and childish about the way she looked, something that congealed in the air around them. Xu, in contrast, did not stand down in her contrasting maturity; a determination that seemed better aged than Rinoa's stubbornness. And, for that heart-wrenching moment, the room was dead silent. Zell, especially, who was quite sensitive to this sort of thing, felt his lungs suck in and draw into a tight fist in his chest.   
  
The two women continued to hold each other's gazes. Rinoa was the one to finally break, and she did so in a crisp one-hundred-and-eighty degree turn. On her heels, flat to her feet, and angrily out the door.   
  
Everyone in the room exchanged a glance, and a shudder ran down every spine when the door closed with an angry and reverberating slam. Xu was the first to make a sound -- she pressed a hand into her forehead and let out a rattling breath.  
  
  
  
  
("We have different questions now.")  
  
Across the red carpet, to the elevator.  
  
(You didn't help us.)  
  
A fist against the panel. It didn't matter which floor, whether the cylinder moved or not. The door closed her in, and the elevator's carpet beneath her feet bounced a little, jolting up a fraction before plummeting. Her forehead against the cold steel wall.  
  
(You didn't help him.)  
  
(You didn't help anything.)  
  
(Again.)  
  
(You didn't help anything again.)  
  
Her chest rose and fell in constricted little gasps. The closed elevator doors were like ice under her hand, almost freezing it there -- lucky for her, on account that it was this hand that kept her supported enough to stay on her feet. Her legs wanted to crumple and drag her into a fetal position, and her stomach twisted in desperate agony. Curl up, curl up, curl up! But her muscles were too rigid.  
  
She didn't quite know where she was going, but she was moving. Eventually the door opened up under her, and she was moving down the sunlit hallway that led to the second-floor classrooms. When she moved, her legs gave up their fight. That brief instant of agony shifted into pain, frustration, and fury. Her knuckles were popping, her elbows stiff, and her head low. How her teeth ground!   
  
(This is your fault!)  
  
"Rinoa!"  
  
And before she could recognize the voice, before she could bring herself to move faster and away from it, there was the swish of the elevator doors closing and the firm grip of a hand against her bicep, tight and almost masculine in its firmness.  
  
"Leave me alone!" She cried.  
  
Quistis Trepe's eyes widened for a moment at the intensity in Rinoa's eyes. Her grip loosened, but just a little and briefly so. In an instant, the blonde's gaze hardened and her strong hold returned. "Just what do you think you're doing? Do you think these games are going to do us -any- sort of good? Do you? What is this, Rinoa?"  
  
For a moment she struggled, pulling plaintively with a sharpness in her mouth. Her look flared and burst into flame, but it was a quick burst, and within an instant she had relented. The glare shifted into a pathetic little drooping shift of her face, and her shoulders lost their firmness. Quistis felt her breath shake, and then she was tugging the dark-haired girl into a tight embrace. Rinoa didn't fight it -- in fact, she clung so tightly that the woman's breath was forced from her lungs. This was partially a good thing. It kept Quistis in check, and kept her from breaking down.  
  
"Oh, Quisty!" Rinoa cried. Her voice was strangled, garbling in the fabric that ran down the slope of Quistis' shoulder. "He warned me, he warned me and I couldn't do anything!" Her words cracked and warbled, so stressed was her throat.  
  
Quistis pressed her lips together and set her hand to the back of Rinoa's head. Putting her face down a little, she found herself unable to do much more than hold her -- and even Quistis knew that this would do nothing. Comfort was as far away as their answers were.  
  
"Quistis, he told me to talk to Odine! And I got so mad at him, I didn't even think...I never even asked him why! This is my fault, everything is my fault!"  
  
"It's not your fault," Quistis said. With her dry personality, there was no question that she would be the last person to go to in need of reassurance. However, when she spoke in that casual, albeit softened tone of voice... It was so nonchalant, flat, and professional... It was Quistis Trepe, and it was genuine. Honest, bare-bones, and without any sort of fancy adornment. "It wasn't any of our fault, Rinoa. It just...happened. And we don't even know quite what 'it' is, yet. But we can't let ourselves get into finger-pointing right now. We need to think about Squall and what happened, and those things only. Otherwise... what chance would we have? Right?"  
  
Rinoa looked up at her. Her face was streaked, but that strange and flat look hadn't left her eyes. Quistis looked down at her for a moment and felt the blood drain from her pinched lips again... And despite the fact that she knew there would be no reply, she still listened for a very long time before speaking again.  
  
"It was between Squall and I," She said. "He had insisted to go first. I didn't want him to, but he insisted and I let him." Her eyes, which had suddenly shifted into a much clearer shade of blue, rolled up to the ceiling for a moment in a gesture that was fragile enough to draw Rinoa's tension, even through her own stress. For a moment Quistis simply held her lips, and then her eyelids began to tremble downwards. Rinoa averted her gaze. To see someone like Quistis Trepe break down would have been too much.  
  
Her voice was startlingly calm. If Rinoa hadn't gotten that phantom-like glimpse of her face, she would have thought the woman completely unfazed. "I think it was because I was afraid. Xu told us that there was nothing to worry about, that our fear was the GFs working against us... But I hardly fought him. I watched it happen, knowing that it could have been me..."  
  
(It should have been me.)  
  
"It's a terrible feeling," Quistis said, more quietly this time.  
  
(His eyes...)  
  
(...I was the last one to look into his eyes.)  
  
(That should have been Rinoa.)  
  
For a moment Quistis felt a shudder of reproach twist through her. It was not only because of her thoughts, however -- it was also due to the smugness that had filtered in with them. Had she, for a brief instant, been proud? Had she been -glad- that it was she who had gotten that final connection, and not Rinoa? For a moment, had she actually been -glad-?  
  
A chill shuddered across her spine at the prospect.   
  
"Headmaster Trepe!"  
  
Both Rinoa and Quistis turned around at the interruption. Quistis was glad that her face was hidden, the guilt on it felt thick, like a plastic mask. They had disengaged soundlessly, Quistis bashfully and Rinoa without shame -- without much of anything, actually. Her eyes were still blank and glazed. Quistis could feel the girl standing behind her, radiating a chilled sort of heat... If that sort of combination were possible.  
  
Headmaster.   
  
("Look, I made you Headmaster behind your back, didn't I? I think I deserve this.")  
  
Squall's voice echoed in her mind, along with that terrible image of his wide-open eyes. Her eyelashes squeezed shut, and a moment of tense silence passed. When she finally opened them, they were moist, but calm. Composed. Perfection in a shroud of tears.  
  
Nida was standing uncomfortably before her. His hands clasped tensely behind his back, and he wet his lips as he looked from Quistis to Rinoa, and then finally to Quistis again. When their eyes met, he twittered open his mouth and said as steadily as he possibly could,  
  
"We have bad news from Esthar. The Galbadian army is gathering. I think that they may have something planned."  
  
  
  
End Part 15/?  
To Be Continued. 


	18. Part Sixteen

"Hello, hello  
Are you out there?"  
--Poe  
  
  
  
"For When You Return"  
Part XVI  
  
  
  
Location: The Time of the Sixth World  
Two Eternities Before Present Day  
  
  
  
"...Scared...?  
  
But I'm not... scared."  
  
"...You will be."  
  
  
  
(Hello?)  
  
(Hello....?)  
  
(Anybody...?)  
  
(Hello?)  
  
(Hell...)  
  
(Hell.)  
  
Squall Leonhart came to slowly and tryingly. Everything was hazed, and his face felt like clay. His joints were stiff and his lips chapped... When he moved them to take in a gasping breath of air, the bottom one split painfully with a skin-wrenching crack--something that he could almost hear as well as he could feel--in order to bring up the salty, metallic taste of blood. He blinked his eyes twice to make sure that they indeed were open... but despite the flays of light, everything seemed blotted out.  
  
He pushed up an arm and heard the crackle of leaves.  
  
Thus, he realized that he was buried in a mass of shrubs and undergrowth.  
  
When he sat upright he was hit with a burst of light. It was daytime. Overhead was a thick canopy of trees, and Squall looked at the sway of greens and browns with a feeling of disbelief clogging his pores. Wiping the back of his hand across his mouth, he finally pushed a palm into the ground and eased himself shakily to his feet.  
  
(Where am I?)  
  
(Hello?)  
  
His heart started to pound sharply, more sharply than it ever had before. Something was wrong. Something was, very, very wrong. And, walking to the beat of that inner drum, he started to move his feet. He became distinctly aware of how quiet things were, how sharp the sounds of his boots against the foliage sounded, how cold his hair was against his forehead when he moved his head from one side to another... the way his ungloved hands clammed up sharply and frigidly.  
  
For a man who liked to be alone, he was suddenly struck with a great desire to talk to someone. Or something. Ten minutes, and he was already going stir-crazy.  
  
Warily, he touched his hand to his temple. His feet did not stop moving. If anything, they moved quicker. He broke into a partial sprint. His legs felt jerky, as if they were having trouble bending properly. A puppet.   
  
Shiva was gone, he realized.  
  
(Xu. She ejected it. She had ejected it.)  
  
This was the last thing that Squall remembered. Quickly he scanned his mind for some sort of rationalization, some sort of possibility, some sort of reason for being here. In doing so, however, he was hit with a wide array of even more questions... Each one more disturbing than the next.  
  
(Where is everyone?)  
  
(Why am I here?)  
  
(-Where- am I?)  
  
His chest constricted, and with moisture in his eyes--for a moment he was glad that he was alone; thank the heavens that no one could see this--he scanned his mind for Shiva one last time, and then checked for anything else that could be of use.  
  
Zenkamuka.  
  
For some strange reason, a feeling of dread passed over him. Squall actually hesitated for a moment, stopping short just to the left of a thick and gnarled oak tree... Glancing from side to side with a quick flicker of thought, he took a deep inhalation of breath and junctioned the creature to his mind. The fullness was familiar, yes, and for a moment a wave of energy passed through his bloodstream.  
  
Actually having to press a hand to his heart to stop it from trembling, Squall didn't realize that he was not alone until the group of hunters were almost upon him. The sound of a cough and a series of cracking undergrowth sent his eyes wide, and he slid quickly behind the tree that he had paused next to. Pressing his shoulder-blades to the wood, he listened breathlessly as the clearing filled and a few voices filtered through the air.  
  
...Why was it that he felt so apprehensive?  
  
Wary, but unaware of why exactly he felt that way, Squall peeked his head out from his hiding place enough to see a group of men stopping to rest in that small clearing. They were dressed oddly, in leather that seemed to have come straight from an animal without much conditioning, and oddly woven shirts. Their hair was grimy and long, tied back in messy and clay-streaked braids or tails. There was not one rifle or modern weapon -- there were only bows, and poorly made ones at that. Primitive.  
  
One of the men's eyes slowly flickered up in Squall's direction. Panicking, Squall quickly pushed himself back against the tree. Holding his breath in once more, he listened. It had gotten quiet again. Heart pounding, it took only a few moments for his chest to start shaking up and down in desperate attempt to breathe.  
  
Why was he afraid?  
  
...What was it that disturbed him so much about this?  
  
Where -was- he?  
  
There was, really, only one way to find out. Releasing the air in his lungs, Squall touched his tongue to the inside of his teeth in order to brace himself. And then, with a calm and hopefully peaceful gesture, he stepped out from behind the tree and raised both hands cordially. This was a good thing -- every man jumped, and every bow was immediately notched with an arrow.  
  
Squall let out a tense hiss at the sight. His eyes didn't widen, not that much, but for the life of him, he could not close them or turn them away. For a moment he was able to keep contact with them as if they were only one set of irises... and then, with a rush, that near-majestic moment passed and he was just a strange man in the midst of smelly, primitive... and not to mention armed hunters. Not one longbow lowered or wavered.  
  
"Uh..."  
  
This was a bad time for his vocabulary to die out. Squall, upon seeing their stares, realized just what place he was in. He too wore leather, yes, but it was conditioned and far from raw in appearance. None of their garments were colored, nor did they have a smoother sheen. His white undershirt was clean and obviously better woven, and his face was--save the scar--smooth and unmarked. He didn't just look foreign, he seemed out of this world.  
  
"...I'm a... little lost," Squall said. For some reason, he was unable to lower his hands. The fact that not one man moved their steady arrows away from him was not much help.  
  
"I..." The hunter closest to him, a bearded man with a mop of unkempt and partially-braided hair, moved his eyes clearly from Squall's face to the brilliantly glittering Greiver pendant that fell across his chest, and then to his face again. "...Does anyone understand what I'm saying?"  
  
A few of the bows lowered. Squall felt an instant of relief, but it was brief. They merely leaned over and whispered to each other, looking at him with a mixture of... was that fear? Were they afraid of him?  
  
Squall looked down at himself. When his eyes lifted again, the bows were up as if they had never left. Yes, they were afraid... but it was a controlled sort of fear. A...deadly... sort of fear. Squall felt his breath fall short.  
  
A tall, but well-built man began to speak. His eyes were intense, and his voice had the wavery sound of someone who was controlling his apprehensions with blatant boldness and volume. Every man stared at him with the same intensity, and Squall warily found himself scuffling a short step backwards.  
  
"Foul beast," His tone took on that of an incantation. The man to the left of him lowered his bow to his side and shakily put two fingers to the center of his forehead, tapping once and then bringing it to his left shoulder. "Return to the pits from which you have came. A-fouled beast, harbinger of damnation," His voice lifted into a reverent warble. "May our marks be true and release our humble lands from the curse that which he had brought upon us, may thy damned soul be undamned..."  
  
Disbelieving, Squall looked from one side of the group to another. Eyes wide and slack-lipped, he fell back against the tree that had once been his sanctuary, numb and terrified. What was this? What -was- this? And then there was the definite creak of arrows ready to be cracked, and he realized what his numb and screaming body already knew.  
  
They were just going to kill him!  
  
His legs started to give out, and with a rush he realized that he was falling, sliding down the trunk of the tree. With a rush of panic he threw out a hand, as if it could ward off what was coming... and as his bottom struck the earth he screamed out a summon and turned his cheek to them, squeezing his eyes shut in dread.  
  
A rush spiraled from the pit of his belly to his heart, gave it a firm squeeze and jerked him forward. His arm twitched as the sensation of energy hit, and then his chest rose up in a painful arch as the Guardian Force called Zenkamuka was pulled from him in a wave of black light--if such a contrasting combination were possible.  
  
Like a ghost coming out of the flesh of its mortal body, Zenkamuka lifted out of him. Squall could feel a strange and cool form of release. His awareness was strange and intense... He could see the bony line of her partially-covered back, the whipping wave of her black hair... and then he could see her face, feel her jaw twine and her head spin from one side to another, languid and sinister. Her shoulders rolled up, and then down in their sockets. There came the feeling of her eyelids lifting, the pierce of those haunting black orbs... and then the noise, the soft backdrop of a thousand screaming voices lifting into a full-fledged torrent of sharp vocal wind, piercing and mind-blowing. Her jaw shifted out of its hinges and her voice joined in the song... a mouth impossibly large and all the more haunting due to that fact. The noise raised in pitch, reached a shattering climax...  
  
...And died. Simply ceased to exist.   
  
Lathered in sweat, Squall fell back. He was vaguely aware of the litter of arrows, thrown astray as the hunters' aims were broken by his summoning... the obscure sensation of blood at his cheek and the quiver of a arrow imbedded just by his face, above his head, and in the ground at his feet.  
  
Heaving, he lifted his head off the trunk and looked in front of him.  
  
They stood slack-jawed, straight and erect. Those who hadn't dropped their arrows carried them blankly at their sides. For a moment Squall thought that they were paralyzed, or dead where they stood... but then someone moved. A man in the back broke into frightened tears, and another fell onto his bottom with shock.   
  
The closest man, however, looked down at his arms, his hands...and then at Squall. There was an eerie darkness in his eyes, something that turned Squall's heart into stone. The hunter was almost smirking.  
  
"An illusion," He said. "The witch, he's fooling us with illusions!" With an accusing finger he pointed at Squall and then turned to face his men. Some of them shifted and turned their eyes to the man against the tree, others paused hesitantly. "His tricks are harmless!" They were urged. "Harmless! Fools!"  
  
(Witch?!)  
  
(...Harmless?)  
  
A hunter went for an arrow, another bent quickly for his bow. Squall, however, didn't wait around to test their aim. With a rush he pushed his hand into the ground and spun up to his feet, pushing off into a sprint before he was even able to fully straighten. He heard a shout, felt a whiz as the first arrow passed his ear--  
  
And that was when he hit him.  
  
The traveler was standing just a few feet from the edge of the clearing. Squall had nearly run into him -- but the man casually held him back with an extended hand, letting the top of Squall's head run harmlessly into his palm. Smack. Squall fell back on his bottom, and found himself looking at an unsheathed sword -- relatively short and thin. Following it up the arm, he eventually found himself face-to-face with a gangly and bemused looking man. He tossed his black braid over one shoulder and smiled wanly.  
  
"A few crops die, and men go witch-hunting. Do you think that executing the first strange man you see will make your corn grow better? Perhaps we can dabble blood on the soil and do rain-dances as well!"  
  
His face, which had been calm and rather good-natured, suddenly shifted into a look of stony anger as he twisted a wrist and arm in order to quickly twist his sword up. An arrow that Squall had just barely seen comingwas slashed away and fell in two clean pieces in front of him. There was a rush, and with a quick motion the traveler snapped his sword like a throwing dagger into the shoulder of the hunter who had shot at him from across the clearing.  
  
There was a cry. Before that bow dropped to the ground the traveler was pulling a second short-sword from a sheath at his back and darted forward to sever another bow in two. Whirling, he took hold of the end of the sword that had been imbedded in the hunter's shoulder and met his belly with a kick, forcing him to the ground and withdrawing the blade in a clean, efficient movement. By then there was a tizzy of movement, and Squall watched dumbly as the traveler deflected another arrow and smashed the hilt of one of his swords into an attacking man's face.   
  
"Some help?" The traveler didn't even sound short of breath, and as he whirled in a quick circle with flashing blades Squall broke enough out of his lameness to push himself to his feet again. The men had all leapt back at a safe distance from the twisting blades -- and Squall suddenly realized that there was no technique in this man's motions... he was simply whipping those weapons around in hope that he'll keep his attackers at bay and the arrows away from his body. He was doing a surprisingly good job at it.  
  
Squall took this opportunity to study him for an instant. He was cleaner, but not by much. This man wore the same strange clothes as the rest.  
  
(Where -was- he?)  
  
Everyone was too involved in the gangly and sword-wielding man to really notice Squall's approach. A man who managed to get at the traveler's back had pulled a dagger from it's sheath -- he was shocked to find a fist holding him back just as he lifted it to stab, and turned around to find himself staring into Squall's icy eyes. Squall was unarmed, and had no magic junctioned -- he simply brought back a fist and sent it spiraling into the man's face.  
  
Most of the bows had been either broken or knocked away. It didn't matter much anyway, with the way that everyone was jumbled together. Squall, who was throwing aside the first man that he had struck, was suddenly under everyone's attention -- before he knew it, a strong pair of hands were wound about his waist and he was lifted tightly off his feet. The traveler was suddenly a distance away with his own problems, and Squall winced to see the man that he had dropped earlier push himself up to his feet in order to take advantage of Squall's struggling immobility. There was a red welt on his face where Squall had hit him.  
  
In a burst of panic, Squall managed to get his feet down and used them to push himself up. Planting his heels into the approaching man's chest, he shoved himself back into the man who was holding him and sent them all plummeting backwards and into the ground. There was a huff as Squall landed on his capturer, and with a knock of his shoulders he shoved himself free of the hold.   
  
There was a whiz and a rush of air. Squall, who was pushing himself to his feet, was nearly struck through the head with one of the traveler's short swords. It quivered upright in the earth in front of his face, and with a startled look he glanced over his shoulder. The traveler was swinging the other sword about, and with a struck of luck broke a stretched bow--someone was trying to shoot him at close range--so that it, incidentally, snapped the arrow back into his attacker's face.   
  
The sound of an approach brought Squall back to his own affairs, and he quickly grabbed the hilt of the sword. Pushing himself and pulling it out of the ground in the same beat, he expertly deflected a blow with the flat of his blade. It was much lighter than his gunblade, and he was able to execute familiar strikes with surprising quickness.  
  
The traveler, much like himself, seemed hesitant to make any fatal blows. However, together both armed men managed to fall the attackers -- Squall put down the last man with a cracking blow to the head, and as the body fell into the dust at his feet he found himself staring at a clearing full of fallen men... with the traveler heaving over the form of his own last strike on the other side. He was leaning on his sword, and the air was filled with a series of painful groans. Eventually, however, his head lifted and Squall met his eyes.  
  
Brushing himself off, the traveler let out a sigh and stepped over the bodies in order to approach Squall. He held out a hand -- looking surprisingly quirky and energetic in doing so... his eyes were almost chipper. Squall was confused for a moment, and then he simply extended a palm of his own and shook the man's hand.  
  
The traveler's lips twitched upward slightly. "Nice to meet you, too -- but I was actually hoping to get my sword back."  
  
Squall blinked, and looked down at the weapon in his hand. Idly, and feeling quite foolish--(That's what you get for being cordial.)--he handed it over. The traveler took it casually, looked it up and down, and then wiped it on the hem of his shirt with a firm sweep. Squall was amused to see that he had cut a thin, straight gash in the fabric while doing so. The traveler didn't seem to notice.  
  
"Well, I think I've had my share of fights for the day." He made a tipping-of-the-hat motion. "I fare thee well."  
  
Fare thee...? When the man turned away, Squall found himself blinking back surprise. It took him a moment to respond, and as a result his voice sounded quite sharp. "Hey! Hey, wait!" Quickly, he went after him. The traveler stopped short as they both stepped out of the clearing, and turned to face him with a crooked eyebrow.  
  
Squall heaved a breath and looked from side to side, before letting out a, "This may sound odd, but... Do you know where I am?"  
  
The man's lips twisted a little, and he smoothed out his face in something akin to dry astonishment. "Why... You're right here, of course." He said briskly.  
  
"No, I mean..." Squall had started to explain himself, but then he noticed the twinkle in the man's eye and felt his face go sharp. "You know what I mean!"  
  
"Of course I do. And I answered your question. Fare thee well."  
  
"Don't 'fare-thee-well' me!" Squall started. The man was quick to interrupt him, however... with that same, strange amusement in his voice.  
  
"Shall I bite my thumb at you? Kick you in the shins and run, perhaps? You -must- be from far away. What strange customs you have!"  
  
"I'm serious!" Squall said. He was brimming with irritation, but tried to curb it as best he could -- after all, not only had this man saved his life, but he also was the only person that he had met so far that seemed to be native to this area and wasn't out to do him any physical harm. "I'm lost... I -need- to know where I am."  
  
"You're in a forest," The man started, and at Squall's glare he put on a bemused grin and continued, he had been satisfied by that response. "Just outside of Merada."  
  
(Merada?)  
  
"Merada?" Squall asked incredulously.   
  
"Yes," The man eyed him strangely, and purposely slowed his voice as if he were speaking to a small child. "Merada. You are in a forest. The nearest city is Merada."  
  
Squall blinked and stepped back. It didn't make sense. He had to have been missing something... There had to be an explanation, something that would set everything right. There had to be something... This didn't make any -sense-.  
  
"Look," the man said. He eyed Squall warily at his reaction. "I just left Merada. I'm not going that way. The next big city is Alve Brook. Unfortunately, that's quite a distance off. If you want to find sufficient supplies and a good chocobo, I'd recommend Merada," He pointed to his south. "There are small villages on the way that I'm going, however, and if you want a guide to one of them, you're welcome to join me."  
  
"Alve Brook?"   
  
"Am I stuttering or something?" The man asked drly. "Yes, Alve Brook."  
  
"Do you know how I can get to Balamb?" Squall asked.  
  
"...Balamb?"  
  
Squall wiped at his mouth and looked down at his feet. He was suddenly very tense, and very worried. This didn't make sense. None of it made sense... There had to be a way...  
  
Crazy. This man was crazy. That had to have been it.  
  
"I'll go to Merada." Squall said evenly. "That is the nearest city, correct?"  
  
"Indeed."   
  
"And it's that way...?" Squall pointed in the direction that the man had before.  
  
His face twisted a little. Obviously, the tone that Squall was using was insulting him, although he met it with a tight and playful little smile. He sounded a little snide, yes, but that undertone of good-nature did not die. "Yes. Due that way."  
  
"Thank you." Squall said. It was beginning to play out, now. He couldn't have been far from Balamb, and this strange man had simply mistaken the name of the city. That had to have been the explanation -- there was simply no other way.  
  
"Yes, well..." The man shifted his gaze to one side, and then did a quirky and cordial little bow -- hardly serious, although it was far from rude. "The best of luck to you. I fare thee well for the third time -- but three's a charm, yes? Of course."  
  
This time, Squall let him turn off and head in the opposite direction. He nodded a touch and let out a lilting little sigh as he watched him go. He had a story in his head now, a decent rationalization, but it didn't relieve him... This didn't remind him of the forest near Balamb... and the way the man was dressed... Those hunters didn't ease his mind much, either. Was there some sort of indigenous village nearby, a historical settlement? Why hadn't he ever heard of it... And where was this strange man heading?   
  
Crazy. He -must- have been crazy.  
  
Squall was turning away when the traveler spoke to him again--he looked over one shoulder to see that the man was still walking away with his back to him, and one hand had lifted a little in the manner of a wave. "Keep straight, and get some armor and weapons when you arrive in Merada. There are a lot of monsters out there these days -- and I'm not only talking about the ones with teeth and tentacles, either." The barest glimpse of his profile, as he turned slightly in his departure. "And if you want to try for a good deal, tell the ironsmith that Greiver sent you."  
  
Squall's heart stopped in his chest and he felt his feet turn to lead.  
  
(...Griever?)  
  
  
  
  
End Part 16/?  
To Be Continued. 


	19. Part Seventeen

"This is the last song  
  
My eyes are open wonder to this  
  
As you hold the secrets  
  
I count the minutes off so perfectly  
  
The chards of broken glass  
  
Sing the strains of a sad old tune..."  
  
--The Smashing Pumpkins  
  
  
  
  
  
For When You Return Part XVII  
  
  
  
The messenger-boy was just that -- a child that was no older than fifteen. His cheeks were flushed as if he were a runner of ancient lore and not someone who had traveled effortlessly by train and by car. His shoulders huffed exhaustedly until he remembered where he was, but when he straightened them he looked just as anxious and terrified as before.  
  
"Repeat it again," Quistis said. It was almost amazing, how quickly she had flipped from soft and comforting to firm and upright. Her demeanor was cold, calculating, and businesslike. Zell managed to meet the boy's eyes and offered him a tight-lipped little smile of reassurance. It didn't seem to help much, but the child did swallow a little and took a shaking breath to say once more,  
  
"I-I'm an apprentice to an electrician in Esthar." Exhale, exhale. Selphie and Irvine exchanged a brief glance from where they were planted side by side on the wall in the headmaster's office, and Rinoa stood rigidly next to Xu and Nida. Cid had traveled out to the orphanage after the night of the party, but was in the process of returning to Garden due to the situation. It didn't matter, however -- Quistis was now headmaster, and acted accordingly. Arms crossed, she listened to the story that she had already heard once with the same amount of--if not more--attention.  
  
"I was working on one of the transports underground -- the system isn't just above the surface, a lot of cables go down to use energy from the generators. A lot of them aren't in use now, since the visibility cloak has been disengaged. That causes a lot of problems, believe it or not. We just aren't made to work without them; they've always been there. Shutting them down affects other things sometimes."  
  
Quistis was letting him talk, but it looked as if she were cutting close to urging him to go on. The boy swallowed again, and nervously went on.  
  
"We were down there trying to patch that transport back into our energy source. There were about six of us -- not many. We were just wrapping it up when a soldier came down and asked us if we were finished yet. I thought it was strange that a guard from the street would come down to check on us, but I didn't think much more of it... I mean, he was a city officer. Why shouldn't anyone have trusted him, right?"  
  
Zell's lips turned white, and he straightened a little from where he was leaning against the headmaster's desk. His blue eyes shifted from Rinoa to Irvine and Selphie, and then with a stiff little shift of his mouth he returned his gaze to the boy.  
  
"When he opened fire, I didn't quite realize it for a moment. I thought it was one of the generators, maybe we had made a mistake and it was melting down. That wasn't the case, though -- we were being -shot- at. I saw three of us go down, and then Lue--my instructor-- was pushing me out of the way. We were trapped, but there was a ventilation grate set in the back to make the place less concentrated, just in case there's a fire or something down there. I managed to get back to the surface through it."  
  
He took another shaky breath, as if talking had stolen it from him.  
  
"Everything was fine on the surface, it was as if nothing had ever happened. Everyone milled about... but the guards. There were so many guards. I tried to get to the Palace and President Loire, but the soldier there wouldn't let me see him... There was something strange in how he was looking at me, and I started to panic. I didn't know what to do, or where to go... I mean, what if -all- of the guards were...? Or... And even if not, I didn't know how to pick one from another. I was afraid that the man who came down after us would be after me... so I left."  
  
"And even -that- was hard. The soldier at the gate asked a lot of questions -- why was I leaving, who I was, what business I had. I knew that something was wrong with this... Eventually, I simply hid and waited for him to get distracted, and then snuck out."  
  
"So I came here. I didn't know where else to go."  
  
"You made the right decision," Xu said. The boy didn't look very relieved.  
  
"And," Nida added, "There have been rumors of Galbadian forces gathering. This is the most that they've moved since the end of the war... and it looks as if they're heading towards Estar. It's clearly an attack..."  
  
"But why?" Selphie asked. "I mean, they already screwed up royally with the whole sorceress thing? If I were them, I'd be hiding in a hole until the next century! They aren't dumb enough to do anything..." She squished up her face for a moment. "-Dumb- again... are they?"  
  
"Attacking?" Rinoa said. Her voice shredded. "But Odine -- what about Odine? We need to see him, if something happens, then--" The breathiness that was eating at her words border-lined hysterics, although she twisted away when Xu offered a hand to her shoulder. "Then we can't do anything at all, Squall, he--"  
  
"We shouldn't jump to any conclusions," Quistis started.  
  
"What? Are you saying that we should just -sit- back?!" Zell exclaimed. "That's insane!"  
  
"This is coming from the guy who drags his team into A Pit of Doom for fun," Irvine said, his tone low and dry.  
  
"That's -Instructor- Drags-His-Team-Into-A-Pit-of-Doom-For-Fun to you," Zell retorted snidely. Selphie's lips upturned a little at that, but it didn't help the fact that Zell was dampened. Stiffly, he shot a glare in Irvine's direction, crossed his arms, and set his back against the desk edge again with a stiff and quiet jaw.  
  
Irvine returned his eyes to Quistis. They exchanged a glance, and then the blonde woman looked over at Nida, who straightened immediately.  
  
"You've tried communicating directly with them?" she asked.  
  
"I--" Nida started. "I'm not quite sure how I'd..."  
  
"It's complicated," Xu added.  
  
"You'd need a direct connection," The boy said. "The system is too new -- someone in Estar would have to match your frequency, and could only communicate in five minute increments. It takes a few hours to recharge."  
  
"We don't need to -communicate-," Rinoa said sharply. "We need to -go- over there and -get- Odine as quickly as possible."  
  
Quistis lifted a few fingers up to Rinoa, silently gesturing for the woman to be patient. Rinoa set her teeth and stood stiffly, although she silently listened to what the acting headmaster had to say.  
  
"We don't know enough right now. And, even if we did, we are in no position to put up a defense, not yet. We need to understand what is going on, and we need to establish a connection. If Laguna is safe, we need to talk to him."  
  
"And Odine," Selphie said for Rinoa's benefit.  
  
Quistis nodded dismissively and went on. "I think that we should send out a small team of scouts. They can patch a connection and let us know what is going on in Esthar." She felt a sudden urge to bite at her longest fingernail; it took a great deal of effort to keep her arms down. She was a leader. She had to act like it... this wasn't a small decision. This wasn't a small affair.  
  
And Squall...  
  
"They will also fetch Odine and bring him back here." She said. "We need to also make contact with Laguna -- hopefully we will get the communication system in order so that we can do that... But I don't think we should do anything more beyond this, not yet. I think that this is a safe idea. I don't want to act any more until I'm sure of the situation."  
  
Xu nodded her agreement.  
  
"Okay then," Irvine said. "Who goes?"  
  
"I want to--" Rinoa started, just as Quistis was replying, "You and Zell," Both women shifted, started, and exchanged glances behind Zell's disgusted blanch of horror under the prospect of working with Irvine. Rinoa was the first to recover, and she then said even more boldly:  
  
"Let me go. I was just in Esthar. I've seen where the tower is."  
  
"A tower isn't hard to spot," Xu said. She was met with a glare.  
  
Quistis was going to say the same thing, but after noting the exchange she chose her words more carefully. "Rinoa, I think that you should stay here-- " Rinoa's eyes shot defiantly in her direction, but Quistis kept herself talking, smooth and steady. "I do not doubt your ability. You know that -- I've fought by your side. However, whatever happened with Squall happened -here.- I think, just in case something new comes up, that you shouldn't stray too far."  
  
Rinoa set her jaw. It was obvious that she had no trust in Quistis' intentions.  
  
Quistis saw this and shifted her lips a little in something between a purse and a frown. "If something happens with Squall, I think that you should be here."  
  
"How?" Rinoa asked flatly. "How would that help?"  
  
"Do you remember the Lunar Base?" Quistis asked.  
  
This was supposed to be a rhetorical question. However, Quistis was surprised to see a strained, painful look shift on to Rinoa's face, and then a light mist of tears. That stony front had lifted a little, only to reveal a frightened and painfully mystified young woman.  
  
"It's... It's foggy... Quistis... I..."  
  
  
  
  
  
The Time of the Sixth World// Two Eternities Before Present Day  
  
  
  
When Squall closed his eyes, he caught the fleeting image of a shooting star.  
  
"The first thing you've gotta do is loose the threads, Scarface."  
  
Squall, torn back into reality, felt the insides of his mouth draw in tightly, and he tried to resist an angry grimace. As always, he was the picture of stoicism, a moving stone statue. However, something about the jouncing, happy-go lucky man at just a slight angle in front of him threw Squall off-guard. It wasn't that he didn't like the guy, it was more a matter of not being able to understand him. That was just as frustrating as it was annoying. Greiver? Was it a coincidence? And if it weren't, who in the hell was -this-? This was some lanky guy with a haphazard smile and the fleeting, absentminded nature of a rouge. There wasn't anything to him.  
  
The forest was thick, and didn't seem to ever end. This was nothing like Squall had expereinced before -- it was too livid of a terrian to be anywhere -near- Balamb, Squall knew the area enough to know full well that this was nothing that he'd ever seen before. Foilage hung ominously overhead, making the late afternoon seem more like evening in its shadow. The branches and brambles that Greiver's shortsword's missed (and there were times when Squall wondered if this was fully intentional, for the man's amusement) tugged at Squall's ratty pleather jacket, and he could only push them aside as he plugged ahead and was scratched.  
  
"Why?" He finally asked.  
  
"Why find a change of clothes?" Greiver asked, setting his foot atop of a fallen log and posing there in a small dab of sunlight as if he were ready for a portrait. A hand went on his hip, and his sword glistened at his side. "Because you look you fell from a different world, that's why! Idiot! You know why those guys attacked you, don't you? It wasn't simply something you just -said- to offend them, although I can't exactly call you 'pleasant' in your defense, either."  
  
Squall too stopped and stood at a short distance from the man, looking eye- to-eye and setting his own hands onto his hips, letting out a little huff that somehow managed to not change his expression. "Whatever." He said.  
  
"Whatever," Greiver repeated, looking just as unphased, although that charming, casual sparkle didn't ever leave his face. He seemed amused. "You're quite a strange fellow, indeed," A little pause, for quirky drama and emphasis. "Indeed."  
  
Squall was going to push out another one of his trademark one-word answers, despite the fact that he had been trying to wean himself from such behavior. However, as he glared at the strange long-haired man in front of him, he caught a glint on the man's chest. For a moment, his mind cleared, and he tipped his head a little in stony curiosity. It was a necklace, a simple tear-shaped stone, jagged and hued like a quartz crystal. It was set into a tiny column of stone, as if it had simply been chipped from a wall, and was bound to his neck by a thin leather cord. As a whole, the thing was about the width and half the length of a woman's smallest finger.  
  
Griever followed the man's gaze and looked down. His fingertips touched the necklace for a moment, and then he was struck with the urge to pull his shirt flaps over it -- but he held himself back and simply asked, "Yes?"  
  
"That necklace," Squall said slowly. There was something special about it, not in appearance, but something more. Something that he could feel. And Squall, without hardly even knowing it, felt his hands go onto the lion pendant that lie against his t-shirted chest. His body suddenly felt very quiet, and he stared wordlessly for a moment, until Greiver harshly broke it up.  
  
"Oh, you have -got- to be kidding!" He exclaimed. "This?" He pointed a slender finger at his pendant, and then gestured toward Squall, and then threw his arms around his stomach in a doubled-over laugh. "Oh, heavens and stars, that is... Oh-ho! Hoo, let me breathe..."  
  
"...You think," said Greiver when he sated. "That simply because -you've- got a necklace that you named Greiver--although why you'd even -name- something like that is beyond me!--I'm going to have, by puuure coincidence," He wriggled his fingers for emphasis there. "One named Scarface or something? Could you possibly be serious!"  
  
"It's Squall." Squall corrected, feeling a little foolish and cold. "My -name- is Squall."  
  
And then, suddenly, everything got quiet.  
  
"Oh..." Greiver said, and he fell slowly into the hush. His eyes grew wide and then he narrowed them, peering at Squall with a slightly bewildered gaze. He clenched his necklace tightly in his fist, and with a peer he let out a long, shocked breath. "I... It doesn't make sense... Squall? Is that really your name... how did you know that I...."  
  
Squall felt his heart stop, his breath suddenly went chilled. "You mean, you did--"  
  
"No, you idiot!" Greiver snapped. "We don't name necklaces here! We don't name swords, we don't name armor, and we certianly don't go around acting like two guys that are both wearing things around their necks are soulmates!" He seemed very intense for a moment, and then let out an easing huff... although that firmness didn't remain. "Now, I suggest that you don't talk like that around here -- you're lucky that I'm not as superstitious as the rest. People who name things suggest people who believe that things have -souls-. They don't."  
  
"Well, we don't know that..." Squall said.  
  
"So, what, your great uncle's spirit is trapped in your boot, is it?" Griever retorted.  
  
"No," Squall said. For a moment, he wasn't frustrated but scared yet again. What was this? What was this strange man getting at? Why, all of a sudden, did he seem so cold? "It's not like that -- it's magic, the guardian forces."  
  
At Squall's words, Griever dropped his leg and stood straight. His chest and shoulders lowered as he breathed down, slow and steady, and set a firm gaze into the face of the man across from him. His voice became very, very flat. "Guardian forces. Like that Griever that you were getting all loop- dee-doo about."  
  
"...Yes."  
  
"Look at me, Scarface." Griever opened his arms a little. And, indeed, he didn't really need to say more, although he did. "Just look." His lanky frame, his pale skin, his slightly unraveling braid, his tattered clothes. This wasn't just a mere man -- this was almost the lowest that a man could get. "We're all like this here, and if you..."  
  
"But I'm not talking about humans," Squall interupted. "Look, I'll show you- -"  
  
"You listen!" Greiver exclaimed. There was a power so great in his voice that it almost seemed to slap Squall across the face. And, indeed, Squall fell back a little. The man had shedded all of his good cheer, and the amusement was gone from his eyes -- there was only intensity, anger, and... yes... a little fear.  
  
"You listen," Griever hissed, "And you listen -good-. I don't know where -you- come from, but this is not a place where the supernatural is well accepted, you understand? Nobody, and I mean -nobody- has the patience that I'm foolishly giving you, and if you talk like that again, you will be killed. And there's nothing that I could do to save you."  
  
Griever stepped back, and showed no empathy to Squall's shocked expression.  
  
A breeze ruffled coldly in the foilage above, and the leaves crackled like whispering spirits. Suddenly, the approaching night seemed to make everything a little darker.  
  
"They sometimes burn people that talk like you. Most of the time, though, they do a lot worse."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
End Part 17/? To Be Continued. 


	20. Part Eighteen

"You're so vain  
I bet you think this song is about you  
Don't you?  
Don't you?  
Don't you?"  
-Nine Inch Nails  
  
For When You Return  
Part XVI  
  
"Phoenix Down," Irvine said systematically.  
  
"Check." Zell replied, digging through their mess of supplies and holding up a few packages. The Garden utility room was dank and dreary, and both men sounded as melancholy as they felt.  
  
"Antidote?"   
  
"Check."  
  
"Eye drops?"  
  
Rinoa watched them from the hallway with a crooked neck as Quistis took her past the open door. There was a painful longing in her eyes, as well as in her bicep, as the blonde's grip firmed at Rinoa's sudden resistance. Her chest rose and fell sharply, and her pale nostrils flared:  
  
"Quistis," she begged.  
  
Quistis shook her head with a tremble of her hair. "No. They can handle it. We need you here, Rinoa."  
  
"Bullshit." Rinoa said darkly. Quistis nearly started at the tone of her voice, but she quickly recovered and lifted her chin. Falling silent--she wasn't going to even bother with a reply--she dragged the raven-haired girl down the hallway and toward the dormitory. Rinoa dragged her feet and was ultimately difficult, but she followed.  
  
However, she -literally- dug her heels in as they got to the dorms.   
  
Quistis jerked, as this sudden objection caught her off guard. Rinoa winced as the woman's fingers accidentally dug into the muscles of her arms, but she leveled her voice and said, quite frankly, "Stop."  
  
"What?"  
  
"I want to stay in Squall's room."  
  
There were standing right in front of the missing SeeD's sleeping area. She hadn't noticed until Rinoa spoke--her mind was too busy on other things. The mission. The mystery... The coldness that seemed to seep out from the normally cheerful girl like potent radiation. "Rinoa..." Quistis started. She wasn't sure if she liked the idea.   
  
Rinoa set her jaw so firmly that Quistis wouldn't have been surprised if it squeaked. Her words, as a result, came out even stonier. "I... want... to...stay...in...Squall's...room." As if saying it more slowly and clearly would give her some leeway. Quistis looked into her eyes for a moment--Rinoa didn't even begin to waver--and after a long moment simply dropped her hold on the girl and reached over to push the door open. She resisted an urge to sweep her arm out like a bellhop in an expensive motel as Rinoa stiffly, chin raised, stepped into the room.  
  
However, Quistis simply followed her to the doorway and leaned against the frame. "I want you to try and rest a little, alright? Sit tight, and we'll talk a little later tonight. The cafeteria will bring you something to eat... is there anything you'd like in particular?"  
  
Rinoa simply glared at her with steely brown eyes.  
  
Quistis sighed. "Listen, Rinoa. There's nothing that we can do until we get a hold of Odine. You -know- that. Until then, we need to try and stay calm."  
  
Rinoa, still intense, nodded with a chill.  
  
Quistis watched her for a moment, frowning. After a while--the tension was beginning to solidify--she closed the door and left Rinoa on her own.   
  
She sat on the corner of the bed with a rigid spine. Despite the fact that no one was watching her, Rinoa continued to look ahead in that same icy fashion. Birds sang outside the window in the Balamb breeze, and sunshine cast a warm glow across the room... but despite the atmosphere, Rinoa knew that she was a prisoner here. She was not physically contained, no, but she knew that everyone was keeping tabs on her. It made her so angry.  
  
Why was she treated differently from everyone else?  
  
She didn't need their protection.  
  
She didn't need their pity.  
  
Rinoa shoved both fists angrily into the mattress on either side of her. Her teeth clenched, her head dropped, her eyes closed. And then, very quite firmly, she stood and kicked the wall that was across from the bed. The jolt snapped through her leg and she almost fell, but despite the pain it felt good. Wonderful, in fact.  
  
Her father hadn't stopped her before, and neither could they. She would not stand idly as her world shattered around her. She would not let herself become a burden.   
  
These thoughts gave her a new rush of energy, and Rinoa untied the front cords of her powder-blue duster with firm fingers. It dropped down around her ankles, and then she bent to pull open the drawer next to Squall's bed. There were a few coats there, something warmer and perhaps less recognizable from afar. Esthar, after all, wasn't nearly as warm as Balamb was.  
  
She pulled up his SeeD jacket and flapped it open. In that motion, however, she was distracted by the garment underneath. Her jaw went slack, her eyes glazed, and her hands--still holding the jacket--lowered.  
  
A formal coat.  
  
Rinoa tipped her head slightly to one side and stared fixedly at it. And then, in a crest, she felt her eyes crinkle and the jacket drop from her clammy fingertips. Swallowing back tears, she ran her fingers across the dark fabric folded neatly in the drawer and shakily drew it out.  
  
Holding it open and looking at it, she could not resist her throat from thickening tightly. Biting her lip, she drew it over one arm, and then around to the other. The garment hung too large on her, but it carried with it an aura so strong that it was almost an embrace.  
  
She lifted the collar and gently took in the scent that lingered in the fabric. Squall. She shuddered at the sudden flow of memories, and miserably drew her arms tightly around herself until her breath nearly stole from her chest.  
  
"...Dance with me?" She said in the phantom of a whisper.  
  
There was only her voice, of course. No reply, no echo. Nothing.  
  
Nothing.  
  
The coat suddenly felt very, very heavy.  
  
Resisting hysterics, Rinoa snuffed out short, suffocating gasps. She clung to her stomach tightly, tried to keep her legs from giving out, and pinched her eyes shut to keep them from spilling over, or loosing all ability to focus sanely. This was no time to be weak. If she broke now, everyone else would be right.  
  
She would not be idle.  
  
She would -not-.  
  
When Rinoa opened her eyes, they were rimmed red. She shuddered again, this time to shake away some of the agony that settled onto her like lice. It didn't go away, but it moved to a place on her that was a little more bearable, although the dreary weight remained.  
  
She had left her weapons in her room. It worried her to travel so far as to go that way, especially if she was being watched. Biting her lip, she rummaged around in search of Squall's gunblade, but it was nowhere to be found. This irritated her, but she had little choice -- there would be weapons in the Ragnorak, and if not, she would find something in Esthar. This wasn't necessarily calming, but it did set her mind at ease for a while, if only in a small, pathetic way.  
  
Besides, her biggest problem was how to get out of here and to the Ragnorak without being noticed.  
  
Twisting her mouth, she looked around the room, this time examining the ceiling and walls with equal interest. She walked to the window, but upon looking out she knew that it would have been deadly to try and escape that way. Frustrated, she stepped back and angrilly stomped one foot.  
  
That's when she saw the air vent. It was on the ceiling and in a corner, just above the small sink and mirror that the room was issued. Rinoa's heart stopped and she felt her breath push out silent pleads as she crossed the room and looked up. Beyond the vent, it looked dark. Where did it go, and would she fit?  
  
Her face in the mirror was white, and there was a darkness in her eyes that Rinoa had a difficulty recognizing when she looked down at herself. For a long while she stared...  
  
(Rinoa, do you remember the Lunar Base?)  
  
(It's...it's foggy...Quistis...I...)  
  
(I need you to get all the information that you can on Guardian Forces. I've got to know about removing them, and what effects they have on the mind. Can you do that, Rinoa?)  
  
(..Zee Guardian Force replaces some of the memories, and they take up more and more as they get bigger and bigger, you zee?)  
  
(Whatever.)  
  
Rinoa squeezed her eyes shut again. She didn't want to look at herself anymore.  
  
Taking a breath, she set one hand on the wall to brace herself and got one foot up onto the sink. With her free hand she managed to get herself up. It was slippery, and once she almost fell, but eventually she got her balance and was able to slowly get her hands up flat against the vent. It was then when she realized that the thing had to have been screwed in tightly. There was no way...  
  
It moved under her hold. Rinoa's eyes flew wide, and with surprised shock she carefully eased it up out of its frame and shifted it in order to slide it back. It was then when she realized that something was weighing it down, something small enough to slide across the angled grate and fall to the door with a small, papery -thwack-.  
  
Rinoa, very quite astonished at this point, looked down past her feet and saw a leather-bound book lying flat on the floor.  
  
Suddenly, she forgot about everything else. Slipping down from the sink into a crouch, she found herself easing into a seated position on the floor. With shaky hands she picked up the thin booklet and eased it open. She hadn't realized it yet, but her breath had frozen in her chest.  
  
It took a while for her to focus, but when she did, her excitement made her tightened insides feel almost electrified. She tried to breathe now, but something was stopping her... and oddly, she didn't seem to quite notice or care, at least not beyond a subliminal level.  
  
The handwriting was choppy and restrained, and yet carried an elegance in its curves that contrasted with the rawness. Squall. Oh, Gods, -Squall- wrote this.  
  
. . . . . ."Irvine suggested that we all keep journals. I think it's a dumb idea, but after everything that happened... I mean, how strange is that? My entire childhood was hidden by these Guardian Forces. -Everything-. And look at us, we're still using them. The soldier's heart never fears, I guess. I think that the soldier's heart is just stupid..."  
  
Rinoa flipped the page.  
  
. . . . . . "...We're heading off to find Edea again. We have to fight our Matron."  
  
The sentences were becoming shorter, more stilted. Less eloquent. Rinoa frowned, and began flipping through the book a little more quickly now, skimming. For what, she did not quite know.   
  
. . . . . . "We went to the Lunar Base today."  
  
. . . . . . "I upgraded my gunblade. It was worth the money, I think."  
  
. . . . . . "I had another stupid dream about Laguna. What an idiot."  
  
Rinoa's eyebrows crinkled, and she felt something begin to build. With each lifeless, boring page, it got stronger and stronger... strong waves pressing against a dam.   
  
. . . . . . "Laguna is alive. He's the president of Esthar now. Holy hell. What a shock."  
  
. . . . . . "I finally got my gunblade to Lionheart. It took a lot, but..."  
  
And then the pages were blank. Rinoa stared at the whiteness for the longest of time, and then it hit her--  
  
Squall had hardly mentioned her once.   
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
End Part 18/?  
To Be Continued. 


	21. Part Nineteen

"Concentrate you on the middle  
Of this one way ride.."  
--Hooverphonic  
  
"There's a man who leads a life of danger  
To everyone he meets he stays a stranger  
With every move he makes  
Another chance he takes  
Odds are he won't live to see tomorrow--  
Secret Agent Man!  
Secret Agent Man!"  
--P.F. Sloan and Steve Barri  
  
For When You Return  
Part XIX  
  
The shadows of Esthar stretched and warped behind the buildings that they clung to as the sun lolled over and down into the womb that was the horizon. The darkness thickened and swallowed everything up into grey until, after that brief moment of transition, the streetlights flickered and lifted, warmly filling the streets with dim artificial light.   
  
Not a soul was out in the industrial area of the city. It was hard to imagine that, only a few blocks down, people milled about cheerfully in the entertainment district, having no idea that the soldiers among them were the enemy. The uniformed men walked about, a few stood watch on a corner here and there, and they were all the more sinister because of the laughter and oblivion that was all around them. No one was aware that the Estharian officers were actually Galbadians in disguise.  
  
The guards near the communications tower were a little more ominous. There was still a bored tilt to their heads, a casualness to the way they held their firearms that suggested great confidence. It was as if they didn't know -- or didn't care -- that they were close to the entrance to the city, that they were in an area where an attack would come first. It was as if they sincerely felt no need for any sort of caution.  
  
Irvine Kinneas watched this from afar, and felt a slight tingle sink into his belly and latch tight there. Sure, there were foolish enemies out there, he'd seen his share of them. But this was the Galbadian army, and they were in the process of taking over an important city. Even a child would expect some sort of opposition, no matter how sly the act... and yet the sentries that he snuck by seemed more concerned with watching for wayward citizens than an enemy, as if they were from the village police rather than an actual military.   
  
"Sheesh." Zell was right behind him, looking prim and formal where he crouched in his Galbadian gear. They were hidden in an alleyway between two buildings. Irvine, who was standing upright in the shadows, looked away from the guard that he was watching and down at him.   
  
"Man," Zell continued. "Are we in enemy territory or a nursing home?"  
  
"I dunno," Irvine said. "It's weird...I don't like it." Ignoring the snort that came from Zell's direction, he craned his head to look at the communications tower looming up in the near distance. A single red light, tiny and obscure, blinked ominously. Tightening his mouth, he shouldered his rifle. "Let's just hurry up and get this over with."  
  
"Yeah, yeah," Zell said. "By the time that Grandpa Galbadia gets his dentures in and notices that we're here, we'll be retired ourselves back in Balamb."  
  
"Yeah, well -- the thing is that they're not -supposed- to know that we're here, alright? And if these really -are- Galbadian soldiers, we need to keep it that way. Understand?"  
  
Zell, standing upright, put his fingers to his head in a stiff salute. "Sir! Yes sir! I forgot that I must follow your example! Inserting stick up ass now, Sir! "  
  
"Are you a SeeD or a walking death wish?" Irvine muttered. And Zell would have retorted, but the sentry had moved and Irvine took the opportunity to rush across the street, keeping watch and managing a pace that, if stumbled upon, they could be mistaken for soldiers on call. However, he worked hard not to be noticed. Zell, sobering a little, took up his blaster and followed.  
  
The street that the tower was on was vacant. The pair slowed their pace as they approached, alternating between looking up at the structure and looking around for any opposition. The night, starry and vibrant against the sparsely lit street, shone coldly upon them. Zell wet his lips, and then started when he looked over to see Irvine removing his helmet and setting it by his feet, before unbuttoning the topcoat of his uniform.  
  
"What in the hell are you doing?"  
  
"This stuff is heavy," Irvine said. "I can't climb in that."  
  
"Who said you were climbing?"  
  
"Who said I wasn't?"  
  
"-I- want to climb," Zell said.  
  
"You just want to pick a fight."  
  
"Oh, come on," Zell said, putting his hands on his hips. Standing there, cocked and irritated, he seemed to contrast with his professional-looking uniform. "Just who do you think I am?"  
  
Irvine, his hair tousled and haggard where it was tied back at the nape of his neck, looked flatly at him and lifted a dry eyebrow. "You need to ask?"  
  
Zell let out a sigh and dropped his arm. "For serious, man."  
  
"You stay down here and keep a lookout," Irvine said. "I'm a better shot, I can cover you well from the tower."  
  
"I can cover!" Zell retorted.  
  
"What are you going to do, punch them down?"  
  
Zell raised his fist. "I'll punch -something- down, you stupid a--"  
  
"Woah, woah," Irvine said, lifting his hands defensively. This was no time for bickering, and he forced his voice to be rational. "You can keep watch down here and direct my shots."  
  
And then, for good measure, he added, "Besides, you're a better ground figher than I am. It's practical, just in case something happens. I wouldn't be able to fight anyone off as well as you."  
  
"Yeah, yeah," Zell grumbled, still eyeing his teammate irritably. "Like those bums would even notice a stick of dynamite shoved up their ass."  
  
"Glad we have that settled," Irvine said. And, reslinging his gun back over his shoulder, he pulled himself up onto the first rung of the tower. Beneath his uniform he wore a form-fitting black shirt -- he melded into the darkness, almost to the point where Zell had a tough time seeing him. Only his face and hands, shimmering in the moonlight when he turned a certain way, betrayed him.  
  
Zell, huffing, leaned against one of the thick iron legs of the tower and crossed his arms over his chest. Lolling his tongue over his teeth, he looked from side to side from behind the visor of his helmet. The night was still, and overhead he could hear an occasional metallic creak as Irvine pulled himself higher and higher.   
  
A few minutes passed. It felt like an eternity to him, so when the voices first filtered into his ears Zell couldn't quite comprehend it, it was as if he were coming out from a dream. Hazily, he pushed his weight up off the bar and listened... gripping his weapon tightly.   
  
It was coming from down the walk. Two guards were walking towards them on the other side of the street, and Zell experienced a moment of panic. His palms grew sweaty, his breath quickened, and he realized that he didn't have the time to relay a warning to Irvine up ahead. Hopefully, the man saw for himself.   
  
The guards, however, didn't even seem to think to look up. Zell forced himself to relax and let out a breath as the two men approached. He couldn't see their eyes, but he knew that they had to have been watching him. The low sounds of their voices still filtered through the air, sounding casual, but he knew that he had to look odd, standing out here all alone in the dark like this.  
  
He lifted his visor up far enough to expose his mouth, and put two of his fingers to his lips and cupped it as if he were lighting a cigarette. Murmuring into his hands, he cast a flickering light spell, and then lowered his hand to his side, hoping that the guards, who were passing now, didn't notice that there was nothing in it.  
  
(...or ask to bum a smoke. That'd be just my luck.)  
  
But they were too caught up in their conversation to even notice him. And then Zell noticed how quick their pace was -- not a run, or even a jog, but something much too fast to be as casual as he had first assumed. These were men on a mission. Curious, he watched them pass, and his eyes narrowed as he heard:  
  
"We don't have a lot of time, the boss wanted 'em up an hour ago."  
  
"An hour? I thought he was gonna do it tomorrow."  
  
"Yeah, but it's gotta be......." After that, they were too far -- Zell could only catch snippets.  
  
"...the shields..."  
  
"...fourteen hours..."  
  
"...inhuman..."  
  
Zell narrowed his eyes, and at the end of the street, he saw the two men -- who were very small figures in the distance now -- bend over and pull at something. And then they were gone.   
  
(What the hell?)  
  
He looked up, but couldn't see Irvine against the darkness. Something told him that he had just witnessed something important, something very important. This was serious. All humor, all sluggishness, and all doubt sank into an iron lining in the pit of his abdomen. A rush of adrenaline coiled his muscles into efficient bolts of energy, and with an increased heartbeat he looked up the tower again, and then anxiously to where the soldiers had been.  
  
- - - - -  
  
Irvine heard the clutter of boots falling quickly against pavement, loud and rapid-paced against the quiet of the dark, and wondered why anyone would be moving so obnoxiously at a time and place like this. What was going on? Of course, the realization soon hit him.  
  
(Obnoxious?)  
  
"Oh, great." Irvine hissed, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment. Leaning back a little on the bar that he was sitting on, he craned his head to look down the street from his high-perch. Sure enough, the area below him was empty, and when he lifted his head he saw that Zell was running down the street.   
  
"What the...Zell!" Irvine hissed, knowing that it was foolish to even try. "Zell! Zell! Where in the hell are you going? Zell!!"  
  
"Hot damn." Clenching his teeth, he resisted an urge to shoot the man, and, blood boiling, he put his eyes back on the open panel on the tower and the wires that spilled out from it. He pulled up his cutting tool again, hissed out another curse, and quickened his pace.  
  
- - - - -  
  
Zell slowed down as he neared the area where the two guards had disappeared. Sure enough, he soon came to a manhole cover in the street. Looking from side to side, he let his heart slow a bit, and then he reached down and lifted it enough to slide it off to one side. It grated a little louder than what he hoped, but when he held his breath he heard nothing but the dull whir of machinery.  
  
A few moments later he was dropping in a crouch in the room below. It was a small space, a half-alleyway, and when he stepped out he found himself in a long tunneled out area that reminded him of a sewer, but the small stream that in the middle of the corridor seemed too black, too... was that oil? It must have been.  
  
He listened for a while and thought he heard a faint murmur up ahead. Slowly, he inched forward and followed the sound. It seemed endless and dank, this space, and the smell of oily machine waste was slowly making him dizzy. The tunnel, despiteits length and arched ceilings, was smothering and claustrophobic. Keeping his footsteps measured, he made not a sound, and he listened intently to make sure that he was not -too- close... this was no time for confrontation.  
  
The corridor, although straight for a period, soon broke into a system of curves and bends. Zell was anxious of not being able to see what was ahead, but the sound of the faraway voices was alluring, calming... as long as they were there and at that distance, he knew would be safe.  
  
But soon, they grew louder as he moved. They must have stopped somewhere. Zell's heart began to thud against his ribcage again, heavy and tense. Slowing, cautious, he walked until he reached a corner where the voices were too close for him to go any further. They were right there, around that bend! They were that near!  
  
And, sure enough, when Zell took a peek around a corner he saw another dark space where there was an indentation in the wall -- there must have been a room there or something, and the two guards had stopped there. Taking a breath, Zell leaned back against the wall that he was hiding behind and listened.  
  
"This isn't as easy as it looks."  
  
"C'mon, Carver. All you have to do is reverse it."  
  
"No, idiot," was the huffing reply. "If we reversed it, it'll just go the way it was before. We don't want the place to be -invisible-, we want to -seal- it. There's a difference."  
  
(Seal...? What the...) Zell's eyes narrowed as this sank into his head, and then widened with realization. (Seal?! The shields! That's why none of the soldiers seem worried about being attacked! They're going to seal the place up! By the time anyone gets an army ready to come here, it'll be too late, there'll be no way in!)  
  
And then, even more ominously.  
  
(...and no way out...)  
  
"But Biggs and Wedge already over-rode the system," the other man was saying. "It should just be a matter of--"  
  
"Just a matter of," Carver mimicked snidely. "Why don't -you- just do it, then!"   
  
"Hey! You two! Get out here!"  
  
Zell felt his heart stop -- that last voice didn't come from inside the room, it came from -behind- him. He whirled around, panicking, and felt his terror widen with the realization that he was only a few yards away from another bend... from behind which, only seconds from coming into view, a third soldier was moving his way. He could hear the ~clomp-squish~ of boots against slick pavement, and then, in a rush, the same sound broke out -behind- him. The other two were coming out... and he was stuck in the middle.  
  
(Countdown starts at three...)  
  
Zell looked quickly from side to side. Fight? But there were three of them, and they were armed. He didn't want to risk it. If something happened to him, then Irvine would have to waste time searching -- by then, the city may already be sealed. He had to get out of this, he had to find a way to warn everyone!  
  
(...two...)   
  
Could he pretend that he was with one of them? No, no, that was impossible! He was terrible at that kind of thing, and even if his performance was brilliant, they wouldn't buy it -- how could he possibly explain how he got here, sneaking around like this?   
  
(...one...)  
  
"Shit." Zell whispered, and he lowered his visor all the way over his face.  
  
(...Game over.)  
  
- - - - -  
  
"What is it?" Carver asked. The man beside him, who was called Hoager, put his hands on his hips and looked at the breathless soldier who was standing across from them.  
  
"General Iskuya just called an urgent meeting. We can't seem to find what we're looking for, and we may have to do something a little more drastic than what we first planned. He wanted you there, Carver."  
  
"Yeah," Carver said. "Sure thing -- Hoagie here seems to know -everything- about the shields, so I think he can cover it himself."  
  
"Oh, shut up," Hoager said.  
  
"Whatever," the solider said. "Just get your asses in gear, okay? This is no time to dick around. We're on a schedule."  
  
"Alright," Carver said. He was going to say something else, but then, suddenly, he stopped. His eyes, shaded by the lifted visor on his helmet, shifted off to one side, and everyone held their breath at the sight of the look on his face. "...did you guys hear something?"  
  
"Huh?" Hoager asked.  
  
"I don't know..." Carver took a few steps over, and then glanced back and forth across the corridor. The scummy walls stretched barely, and liquid plipped and dropped against stone. He came to a stop next to the silently moving oil stream, animated only by an occasional rush of foam or bits of debris. For a silent moment, he looked around.  
  
"Nah, nevermind." He said, although his eyes said otherwise. "Guess I'm just paranoid."  
  
"With the shit that we're going to do in mind," the third soldier said, "You should be more than just paranoid, man. You should be freakin' terrified."  
  
Carver and Hoager exchanged a glance.  
  
"Just what is the boss planning?" Carver asked.  
  
- - - - -  
  
The oil was thick and a little warm -- it felt as if he were in a wet, rubbery womb. When Zell slid into the small channel, he didn't make a sound... as if he were being swallowed up by quicksand, he was absorbed into the stream. It wasn't very deep, but he let himself sink as low as he could -- it was enough for his entire body to be covered, and it took a moment for his body to scrape the stone floor. If he were standing, it would have been close to thigh-deep.   
  
The flow was slowly easing him forward, as if he were being forced down the esophagus of some gigantic throat. Zell breathed raspily in the slightly sealed safety of his helmet, but he knew that he didn't have much time before he'd lose the luxury.  
  
Time.  
  
Here, there was no concept of time.  
  
It was like an abyss.  
  
He couldn't see, he couldn't hear, and with oil cushioning him on all sides, the rest of his senses suffered. He couldn't even be -sure- that he was moving, although he hoped that he was. Idly, he felt the dull and distant scrape of stone against his fingertips, as he tried to propel himself downstream and toward safety... but it was so slick, he couldn't get a grip. His fingers just slid. Rejoined the state of Nothingness.  
  
His uniform had absorbed a lot, and he felt himself sinking, felt the oil push itself into his flesh... he was so heavy, could he even stand if he wanted to?   
  
(Please.) Zell thought. (Please let me be moving.)  
  
(Please let me get away.)  
  
He couldn't hear.  
  
He couldn't see...  
  
Something lapped at his chin, and then, with a rush, he tasted the bitterness of oil as it began to pour into his helmet. He felt his head begin to sink, and with a rush of panic, oil flooded into his nostrils. In an instant, his entire being was taken in by the thick darkness.  
  
End Part 19/?  
To Be Continued. 


	22. Part Twenty

_"Let us go then, you and I,  
When the evening is spread out against the sky  
Like a patient ethersized upon a table;  
Let us go, through certian half-deserted streets,  
The muttering retreats."  
_--T. S. Eliot

For When You Return  
Part XX

"_This is Irvine Kinn---, Qu--tis, can---hear me? I've lost Zel--and---Est--we--I--don--k--_"

The scratchy message closed with a battering of chaotic sound, something that was a mixture between the screech of metal and a scream, gunshots, and a crescendo of cracling static that rose to climax, and then cut off in an ominous silence. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. The quiet scared Quistis Trepe more than Irvine's breif message ever could. Something had happened. Something terrible. She could feel it, a darkness in the pit of her belly that rose into her lungs, made her breath toxic and black. Noxious.

She had thought that the worst was over. She thought that she had dealt with enough distress in her life, hadn't she made up for the rest of it already? The situation with Edea was enough, but now...

(Squall.)

If only he were here. If only she weren't so confused. Ellone had said that their companionship, that their union as a group would keep them infalliable. As long as they stayed together, everything would be okay. And everything had been okay. Everything. But now... she could feel her reality shattering, being torn apart to the tune of Irvine's distress call from the top of the communications tower. They had recieved it the night before, and a few quick, desperate desicions took them onto the next train to Esthar.

She sat in their cabin, back straight against the red plush of her seat, one leg crossed stiffly and professionally over the other. If anyone had looked, she would seem to be the picture of composure and sanity. It didn't matter. Nobody looked. Nobody spoke. Rinoa's coldness had intensified since their last enounter, and the dark-haired girl seemed listless and lost where she sat in an equal stony silence in her nearby seat. She'd put up a small, firm fight to come along. Quistis gave in without much of a retaliation. She didn't feel like battling with the girl, and deep down she knew that she needed her. With Irvine, Zell, and Squall all in states of question--

(We're breaking, breaking, breaking apart...)

--there didn't leave a whole lot of their group left. Selphie was the only other person in the cab, and she was the only one moving, really -- her leg twittered and shook, but it was a nervous shake, something that was almost as bad as the fact that she had hardly spoken since they'd boarded the train. She didn't look out the window, just at it, and that strange shift in her character was like a punctuation mark to the stillness in the room. The floor vibrated beneath them as the train glided down the tracks, and made Quistis' insides constantly jostle and churned. She was going to be sick.

She had unjunctioned her guardian forces, just as the rest of them did, but she could still feel them swimming in her brain, lost. No, wait, lost wasn't a good word...  
  
(Waiting. This wasn't confused, this wasn't innocent. This was Predatory.)

"I can't take this anymore," Rinoa said, and her voice against the silence was like a bullet. She rose to her feet and set her hands on her hips, looked at the window. Paced. They were reaching the outskirts of the city, and would enter in a few moments. The lights of Esthar gave off an ominous, dreadful glow. "I mean, we have no idea what we're walking into."  
  
"Yes we do," Selphie said. "We're walking into Esthar."

Rinoa cast her a cold little look, and Selphie immediately lowered her eyes to her hands. This was probably the worst of it all, Quisis thought, the veil that seemed to have swallowed up the once vibrant, optomistic girl. There was no mirth in Rinoa's black eyes, and the chill there was enough to almost kill what little hope that Quistis had left. Maybe everything _would_ turn out okay, perhaps they'd find what they needed to safely in Esthar... but Rinoa was already lost. There was a different woman pacing on the other side of the cabin, and Quistis didn't like it.

"This is our best chance," she said. "For everything. Odine will be able to help us."  
  
"Odine wouldn't take a piss outside of his own agenda to get his own mother off her deathbed," Rinoa retorted. "You know that."

"You have to find a little faith, Rinoa," Quistis said quietly. "I know, _trust_ me... I _know_ that we don't have much. But if we don't hold on to what little we _do_ have, we're going to fail before we even get a chance to try."

"I know that," Rinoa said quietly, and Quistis saw some of the stiffness leave her jaws, her shoulders, her gaze. "I'm just so scared."

And although scared was a terrible thing to be, especially now at a time when it was essential to keep a cool head, Quistis felt a wave of relief. This was a touch of the old Rinoa, the innocent, empathetic Rinoa who always said what she felt, said what they didn't want to say for themselves. This was a woman who wasn't afraid to admit to her fears. 

"Quistis," Rinoa said out of the blue, and the tone of her voice was heartbreaking. "Do you think that Squall loved me...?  
  
Quistis never got a chance to answer. She never even got a chance to think about it, because it was then when there was an earthshattering explosion, and everything around them ceased to, for a moment, exsist.

The sound made her mind go blank, and then Quistis realized that she was flying from her seat. She saw Rinoa's eyes widen, her mouth take on a similar shape. Her stomach rose up and jumped into her chest. Perhaps Selphie screeched, but it was in such perfect harmony with the squealing of slicing metal that Quistis could not pull one scream out from another. She couldn't even discern her own, although her mouth was open, and she could feel it. It pulsed up out of her lungs like a thick, electrified iron rod.

She saw the opposite wall come hurtling towards her, heard--felt--the crunching and crumbling thunk of Rinoa hitting the upholstery nearby (the whites of her legs, flailing), and then she herself crashed into oblivion. The world spun, and with a shock she realized far in the back of her brain that the train was whirling off the rails. She felt a dull, bone-jarring thud as it hit the walls of the entry-tunnel to Esthar, and her head snapped up just in time to see an amazing spectacle of crushing metal pop into the side of the room like thousdands of deflating aluminum cans. Smoke, fire, the pulp of bodies. It was hurtling towards them at an alarming rate.  
  
She squeezed her eyes shut, and waited for the wave of death to hit them.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

The sound of the crashing train resonated throughout the entire city. Every person on the streets rose their heads to see a billow of smoke rise, and then curl against some unseen barrier in a beautiful and yet odd arrangement of swirls and wave-like churns. The first twinges of panic began to rise in the population's bloodstream, and as small children clung to their equally confused mothers, a voice boomed out from everywhere and nowhere at once--  
  
"_People of Esthar_..."

And something about the quality of the tone made every single person who heard it's blood run cold.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Deep within the bowels of the city, an old man babbled to no one. His face was pulled down by gravity, his eyes were yellow and stale, and his teeth rotted from his head. He looked like he had been sitting in that corner of the tiny jail cell for centuries, and something in his gaze suggested that his mind had, _ha-ha-to-them!, _found a means of escape.

Irvine Kinneas watched him warily from his own corner of the cell. The basement prison seemed cruelly primative to him, with cast-iron bars, metal floors, and a narrow dank hallway that connected the rows of open cells together. He could hear, from his and Mumbly's neighbors, sounds of huffing, cussing, and down at the far end of the hall, constant and insane screaming.

He sat with his back against the wall, wearing only his t-shirt and the soldiers' pants that he had come in with. They had taken his coat, and the basement was kept at a freezing temperature. He kept himself still, but beneath his flesh he could feel his cells shaking in an effort to keep warm, his lips and lungs felt numb. His nose was running.

Luckilly, though, he had something to keep his mind off the cold.  
  
(Goddamnattentiondeficitchickenwussbastard.)

And he even muttered some of this, which he knew was slowly putting him in the same league as his cellmate, who was animatedly having a conversation with no on in particular at that very moment. His head was throbbing from where a Galbadian soldier had put the butt of his rifle into it, and his left leg felt stiff and sore where he had fallen the last ten or so feet from the tower in his effort to avoid the gunfire that had been aimed at him. They took him alive. Irvine waited for the time to come for them to take advantage of that, and he wasn't looking forward to it. He was going to be interrogated, and it was going to be painful. SeeD or not, training and real-life instances were two very different things, and he was twittering and anxious.

He sucked on his lips and looked over his surroundings for another hopeless moment. It was simple, and yet very efficient. They had searched him, taken everything but the clothes on his back--and even some of -_those-_, Irvine thought with a shiver--and the bars looked sturdy. Old, but sturdy. Ominous. Dangerous. They were the kind of bars that surrounded someone that wasn't going to live very long within them.

Suddenly, the floor rose up in a cry of unison as the entire place shook and the bars rattled, punctuated with the dull roar of a distant explosion. Irvine felt himself sprawl the short distance to the floor, more out of shock than actual lack of balance, and the afterjolts radiated through his flattened body like a poison.  
  
"HOO-haaa!" The old man croaked.

His mouth had gone dry, and Irvine lifted his head to watch the people in the closest cells do the same. His eyes met a young man's on the other side of the hallway, and for a moment they shared a mutual emotion, before the other man's gaze went cold and impersonal again. Shakily, he withdrew back into his own boundaries and tried to stand up. Irvine eased himself back into his seated position as well.

The dull sound of a booming voice filled the air all of a sudden, and Irvine strained to hear it over the babbling of his roomate, who had gotten more excited by the strange event. Irritated, Irvine tried to block him out, and then noticed an intercom on the far end of the hallway. The screen had popped out, it was broken. He knew, however, that someone was speaking on it now. Someone important, _something_ important.  
  
What was happening?

The door opened on the other side of the hallway, the side that he couldn't see from where he was in his cell, and the sound of laughter was sucked into it as someone--or was it more than one person?--entered the area. The heavy clomp of booted footsteps, definitely a small group now, Irvine had discerned, moved down the hallway and towards his cell. There was something powerful in those steps, something confident. Something cocky. The pace was slow and enticing, like a snake trying to disarm its victim, making him feel helpless and trapped in the poison-dripping fangs of danger.

They were coming for him. Something in his heart knew it.

(It's time.) Irvine thought with a breath of resolve. (Time to be strong.)  
  
But then one of them spoke.  
  
And at the sound of that voice, all strength left Irvine Kinneas.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Rinoa lifted her head. It was wet, and she knew that she was bleeding. Something had stripped off the wall, and she could feel it heavy on her back. Groaning, she tried to move. Her body was stiff, but everything seemed essentially intact. With a wince she shifted her hips, tried to wriggle out of the rubble that was consuming her. It wasn't too heavy, and she was able to ease herself up into a semi-seated position.

Quistis was kneeling next to Selphie. Her hair was in disarray, and her arm was smeared red. It seemed to glow. Selphie was dazed, and Rinoa watched detachedly as Quistis tried to get her up, moving. Keeping her conscious.

They were alive. There was no reason that they should have been.  
  
Rinoa looked off to her left. There was a wall of rubble, chaos fixed in time, just paces away from her. Sliding forward a little, she moved her hand to touch it. It was smooth, like glass.  
  
It -_was-_ glass.

Or something like it, at least. Curious, frantic with it now, she ran her hands up and down the wall of damage and rose to her feet. There was something between them and the other half of the train. With a creak, as she shifted her weight, she felt their side of the cab groan and slide down a little. Part of the ceiling pulled away, and from there she could see sky.

The sheilds. The shields had cut the train in two.  
  
A few seconds earlier, and they would have been on the other side of that wall. They would have smashed into it like an accordion under the weight of a semi-truck tire, and there would have been no chance for them. A small river of blood ran through the tightly packed metal on the other side of the sheild. Rinoa watched it from the corner of her eye, felt her heart stop in terror and wonder.  
  
Someone had turned on the sheilds. But they weren't material, were they? Weren't they just supposed to cloak the city from view?  
  
Rinoa didn't know. But as she touched the chaos-warmed invisible barricade, something else came to her realization to make the latter part cease to matter.  
  
"We're trapped." She said.  
  
"Rinoa?"  
  
"We're trapped in the city. Everyone is."  
  
"I don't understand." Quistis said.  
  
Selphie mumbled something, and then shook her head, cleared it. "They must have did something to the cloaking sheilds, they..."  
  
"_People of Esthar_..."  
  
The three women raised their heads. Reality was still shaky for them, and they had to exchange glances to assure themselves that the strange, booming voice was real. Someone was addressing the city.  
  
"_You are now the prisoners of the Galbadian army. Your city has been sealed_."  
  
From the shattered sanctuary that had been their train, the muffled sounds of what was starting to be a panic started to tingle in the air. Rinoa, breathless, stared at the ceiling, as if the voice were really coming from the sky.  
  
"_You have seventy-two hours to give us possession of Doctor Odine, alive and in decent health. If we fail to aquire him by this given time, we will allow Esthar's oxygen to continue to deplete, as it is beginning to now, and every man, woman, and child will die_."

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Screams filled the air, but they were distant in the city's electronic mall. The area was vacant and dark, as the entire sector had been shorted out by the nearby train accident. The young teens that had populated the area had quickly gotten out, panicky--this sort of thing never happened--and the terrifying public announcement to the city cleared out the scragglers. Only two lone soldiers walked down the wide corridor, weapons in hand and eyes peeled.  
  
They had already pretty much taken care of those that they considered a threat. The Estharian law enforcement men who were not part of the takeover were quickly and easily disposed of, as they were not aware of the fact that their comrades were enemies in their uniforms. These men were all trained together, they all volunteered towards the same cause. A new life, a new city. Never would anyone had thought that it would come to this.

One of them, Granger, secretly hoped that they would stumble onto Odine and save the day, although he had a feeling that the shopping area would be the last place that a crazy guy like that would hide. And hiding he was, he must have known that they were coming, for his lab was vacant--not only of the man himself, but of all of his notes and documents as well. Iskuya was furious when he found out.

Their leader kind of scared him. There was something about the man, the way he behaved sometimes, that just set him on edge. Not that Granger got a lot of chances to actually see him, but he heard stories. And he'd watched from afar, as Iskuya, in the middle of a speech, would start to twich and pulsate, his eyes wide and yet pinched at the same time. And then he'd be fine, like it never happened. Sometimes his voice changed, like he became a different person in the same body. People said he was crazy.  
  
Wouldn't be the first general to have _that_ behind him, though.

His partner, Led, was a stocky man with a twittery way of looking around. Funny, though, as much as his eyes darted about, he never seemed to actually see anything, like he was too excited to know how to focus correctly. It was no surprise--although it sent a jolt through poor Granger--that off on Led's side there came a loud creak, a softer bang, and a hint of motion that the stockier man didn't even seem to notice. Only when Granger lifted up his rifle did the other man snap his head up, and they both looked to see a dirty man in chocobo boxers come pulling up out of the floor. His blonde hair was messy and strewn all over around his head, tinged greasy and black in places. He was obviously heaving, exhausted. He barely seemed to notice them, or maybe he was at a point where he didn't care.  
  
"What the _hell_?"

It was so ludicrous a scene that Granger forgot what he was doing, exactly. He just stared at the man, the man stared back, and for a moment there was a confused stillness between them. Eventually, though, Granger snapped out of it and belted a harsh. "Get your hands up!"  
  
The man complacently complied. However, when his palms lifted to face them, the two soldiers were suddenly struck with a blast of radiant blue light. Granger hardly had time to realize that something dangerous was happening, and before he knew it every bone, tissue, and organ in his body was petrified. A chill numbed and stopped his brain, and then the ice inside him shattered his innards into what seemed to be millions of sharp shards, pushing out, in, sideways--oh, the pain! He crumpled.  
  
The violent pain was blinding, and then Zell Dincht, survivor of the tunnels, emerger from the depths, was at him and pummeling with his fists. Granger could hear Led's cry, and then, eyes squeezed shut, he swung his rifle at the attacker--having forgotten for a moment that it was meant to be fired, not weilded as a club--and he felt a satisfying smack of skin. Zell fell to the ground, heaving and stunned a little, which made him an easier target. Granger swung his rifle again, cracked the half-naked man on the side of the head, and then kicked him firmly in the side. His shoulders rose and fell haggardly, his blood still felt jagged in the aftermath of the spell, but adrenaline kept him upright and firm.

Led cocked his rifle and pointed it in Zell's face. With slow, deliberate motions he used the tip of his toe to ease the groaning man flat on his back, and then he firmly ground his foot into the top of his chest. "I think I'm a decent shot at this range, don't you, Granger?"  
  
He held his side tenderly, even though the waning ache was everywhere. "I'd like to hope."  
  
"Don't make me find out," Led said down to Zell.  
  
"Oh, I trust your capability, believe-you-me." The blonde croaked in reply.  
  
Furious at his lack of an adequately fearful response, Led bent and forced the barrel into the soft flesh of Zell's cheek. It pudged up humorously, and his mouth made a little sideways fish shape in its wake, one eye squished. His pale, bare legs shifted and kicked a little on the ground.  
  
"I'm going to give you three seconds to tell me why I shouldn't kill you." Led didn't care actually, he just liked to talk when he had a gun pointed at someone, it made him feel like he was in the movies. Honestly, he planned to kill the man at two. However, he never got around to it, as his gun was suddenly gone out of his hands. Shocked, he looked at his empty palms, and then up at the sound of the clatter of the both of their weapons on the other side of the hallway. What he saw, though, was not that, but the cracking aftermath of a whip, and three armed women.

Quistis snapped the far end of her whip back into her ready grip. "I think you should hand that man over, before we start taking away parts that _are_ attatched to you."

Selphie squished her face up, and, added. "Speaking of _parts_.... Um...Quisty, while you're at it, maybe you should snag a pair of one of their pants, too."  
  
Zell, flaming red all of a sudden, put his hands over his scantily-clad self..

- - - - - - - - - - - -

"I didn't think they had earthquakes here, ya know?"  
  
"EXPLOSION."

Irvine's heart pounded in his chest. No way. No _goddamn_ way.

"I don't know _what's_ up, but I don't like it. They never tell us anything here. Heh. They're going to be sorry someday." That voice, especially, so cool and self-absorbed, resonated in Irvine's head like a foghorn. He could almost taste the tone, could close his eyes and picture--  
  
"SHOCK."  
  
Irvine didn't need to close his eyes. One slow, wary upward glance, and he saw what his ears had told him would be there. And, sure enough, pale-faced and askew stood Seifer Almasy, just as speechless as Irvine himself was. Like a bad colonge, his posse wafted behind him. Raijin's eyes were bulging, and Fujin... well, was _Fujin._

All were in soldiers' uniform.

Part 20/?  
To Be Continued.


End file.
